Why do so many kindergarteners get their eyes tested for problems?

  Nowadays, many kindergarten children are found to have eye problems, myopia? Astigmatism? Then they are taken to the ophthalmology department by their parents on weekends.  Why is this?  First of all, China is a region with a high prevalence of myopia, so refractive error (including myopia, hyperopia, astigmatism) is a key item in children’s physical examination; secondly, most children before the age of 4 cannot fully understand the vision chart, and can only check their refractive state, but cannot combine with eye development for assessment, so it is quite difficult to check.  Therefore, the “Infant Vision Screening Instrument”, designed for younger children, has taken on this important task. As a machine, it was designed from the beginning to have a high sensitivity in order to reduce the chance of misdiagnosis. It is better to have a false positive, so that this group of children can be screened out and then go to the hospital for further exclusion. It is better not to have a false negative and miss a child with a problem. Therefore, a significant number of children screened by the infant vision screening device will be found to be “positive” (problematic). Parents should not worry about this, but go to a regular hospital ophthalmologist who will give you medical advice after examining your child.