Cryotherapy for Retinopathy of Prematurity: Six Years' Experience.

Khwarg, Sang In; Yu, Young Suk

Original Article

Journal of the Korean Ophthalmological Society 1995;36(7):1137-1146.
Published online July 1, 1995.

Cryotherapy for Retinopathy of Prematurity: Six Years' Experience.

Sang In Khwarg, Young Suk Yu

Department of Ophthalmology, College of Medicine, Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea.

미숙아 망막증에 대한 냉동치료술 : 6 년간의 경험

유영석(Young Suk Yu),곽상인(Sang In Khwarg)

Abstract

We report our 6 years' experience of cryotherapy for retinopathy of prematurity(ROP). Hospital records of 85 premature infants who underwent cryotherapy for threshold ROP or prethreshold posterior zone ROP during 1987-93 were reviewed. Among the 145 cryotreated eyes, 124 eyes (85.5%) had favorable outcomes and 21 eyes(14.5%) had unfavorable outcomes. The complication rate following cryotherapy was very low. Refraction at the age of 6 months showed that the incidence of myopia was high and the degree of myopia was significantly higher in the moderate cicatricial ROP group than in the non or mild cicatricial ROP group. These results suggest that cryotherapy for acute stage of ROP is appropriate and refractive changes should be followed-up to detect myopia.

Key Words: Cryotherapy;Myopia;Outcome;Retinopathy of prematurity