Epidemiology of Child’s Ocular Globe Injury: A Retrospective Study at the University Teaching Hospital-Campus of Lomé (Togo)

Abstract

Aim: To study clinical and epidemiological characteristics of child’s ocular injuries. Patients and Method: Retrospective study on medical records of children suffering from traumatic injuries of the ocular globe presented to the Campus Teaching Hospital (CHU Campus) of Lome from 3 January 2015 to 30 June 2016 (18 months). Age, sex, nature of the traumatising agent, consultation delay and the width of the injury (zone I, II or III), the classification of ocular trauma, according to “Birmingham Eye Trauma Terminology (BETT) system”, connected lesions have been studied. Results: Twenty children about 46.51% children presented for ocular trauma have been suffering from a globe injury. The average age was 6.68 years with the extremes of 1 year and 12 years; the age bracket of 0 - 5 years was more represented (45%); predominance was more from the female with a sex-ratio = 0.67. Eighty percent of the children were from rural areas while twenty from urban areas. The delay of consultation was less than 24 hours in 40% of cases and 15% consulted between 24 h and 72 h after the trauma. Traumatisms were entirely unilateral and penetrating within a majority of 15 (75%) cases of which a “stick” is the traumatising agent of the most frequent (40%). The seat of the injury was the zone I (85.71%) and zone II (14.29%). Connected lesions were dominated by iris hernia 7 (35%) and traumatic cataract 6 (30%). Conclusion: children’s traumas were high predominantly and they came in majority from rural zones. Prevention through awareness remains the best treatment.