Using the Postoperative Visual Acuity to Monitor the Quality of Cataract Surgery: Does the Day One Visual Acuity following Cataract Surgery Correlate with the Final Visual Acuity?
PURPOSE
Monitoring the visual acuity following cataract surgery is used as a measure of the quality of the surgery in blindness prevention programs in middle- and low-income countries. While the day 1 visual acuity is usually available, the (final) visual acuity after several weeks may not be available, as the majority of patients may not return for review. This study was undertaken to ascertain if the early and late visual acuities are correlated and if the day 1 visual acuity can be used to predict the likely final visual acuity.


METHODS
A retrospective case note review was undertaken of all eyes having cataract surgery over a 6-month period.


RESULTS
There was a positive correlation between the day 1 and week 6 visual acuities in both the World Health Organization categories (Spearman coefficient = 0.4666, P = 0.001) and the logMAR visual acuity scores (Spearman coefficient = 0.5425, P = 0.001).


CONCLUSION
In blindness prevention programs in middle- and low-income countries with poor postoperative follow-up where it is not possible to document the final visual acuity in all the operated cases, there is merit in documenting and monitoring the day 1 visual acuity as a quality control measure.
['Aliyu|Halimatu|H|', 'Mustak|Hamzah|H|', 'Cook|Colin|C|']
D000293:Adolescent D000328:Adult D000368:Aged D000369:Aged, 80 and over D002386:Cataract D002387:Cataract Extraction D005260:Female D005500:Follow-Up Studies D006801:Humans D008297:Male D008875:Middle Aged D011184:Postoperative Period D019984:Quality Indicators, Health Care D012189:Retrospective Studies D013997:Time Factors D016896:Treatment Outcome D014792:Visual Acuity D055815:Young Adult
Cataract surgery outcome cataract surgery postoperative visual acuity cataract surgery quality monitoring