Myopia and outdoor sports in university students of Mendoza, Argentina

Abstract

Purpose: To assess the prevalence of myopia in university students from Mendoza, Argentina.
Methods: This was a cross-sectional study of randomly recruited subjects from the National University of Cuyo, Mendoza, Argentina. Myopia was defined as uncorrected vision lower than 8/10 tested with decimal scale Snellen visual acuity charts and simultaneously as a spherical equivalent refractive error of -1,00 D or worse in right eyes, measured with autorefractometry without cycloplegia. The subjects answered a questionnaire about their sports activities.
Results: The present study involved 2299 students with an average age of 24.65 ± 7.87 years, of which 1562 (67.94%) were females. In total, 1613 (70.16%) subjects had an uncorrected visual acuity equal or greater than 8/10, that is, only 29.84% may have had clinically significant myopia or astigmatism (or other less common refractive errors). In total 1042 (45.32%) said they wore glasses, but only 603 (26.23%) had brought them. Of those who said they used correction (brought or not), 710 (30.88%) had myopia of -0.50D or less in the autorefractometry, 553 (24.05%) had myopia worse than -1.00D, 133 (5.79%) had astigmatism worse than -2.00D. Among the three groups who “did not practice sports”, or practiced “indoor” or “outdoor sports”, visual acuity below 8/10 was present in 27.58%, 24.88% and 19.88% respectively.
Conclusion: The prevalence of myopia defined as visual acuity lower than 8/10 or as non-cyclo autorefractometry of -1.00D or worse, was close to 25% in this Latin-American population.