TEACHERS VISUAL SCREENING IN A PRE SCHOOL ENVIRONMENT

Background: According to a study of the National Observatory of Health, in Portugal (2006), 54% of children aged between 0 and 14 years have never been observed by an ophthalmologist. This study aims to evaluate teachers’ use of Lea Hyvärinen’s® vision tests games for preschool children in a classroom environment, in order to predict children’s needs of visual correction and to recommend them for ophthalmologic observation.

Methods: Visual Acuity of 115 children attending kindergarten was evaluated using the following Lea's tests: Near Vision Card with Measuring Cord (NVCT), Playing Cards (PC) and Domino Cards (DC). The last two ones were used by their classroom teachers, trained by a low vision teacher, in a playing situation with 3 kids and 2 observers.

Results: No significant differences were found in near visual acuity between Playing Cards and Near Vision Card with Measuring Cord test. Significant differences were found when the Domino Cards game was used.

Conclusions: Teachers’ evaluation of near visual acuity with PC in a play situation in the classroom is useful to detect early the visual correction needs of children especially in regions where vision health services are not easily available. Furthermore it raises the teacher’s awareness and avoids that visual problems may affect children function and school performance latter namely on reading and writing learning.