Occlusion Therapy for Exodeviations in Young Children-A Three-Year Follow-up

Abstract

The authors re-examined 34 of 38 children who were originally reported in 1979 with exodeviations. They had discontinued 3 to 6 hour daily occlusion therapy on the preferred eye for an average follow-up time of 33 months. In 78% of the patients this treatment had a lasting effect on improvement in the latency of the deviation as well as maintaining a decrease in the size of the strabismic angle obviating the need for surgery. Of those patients who eventually required strabismus surgery, we believe that the excellent post-operative results obtained were due to the time spent on part-time occlusion therapy. This treatment resulted in central fixation in each eye, a retardant to the development of suppression, the presence of fusional amplitudes, and a surgical procedure performed on an older child.

• exotropia
• occlusion therapy