Brookfield Lions Kids Sight Program a Success

At the Brookfield Lions 12th Annual Charity Breakfast held at Michael’s at the Grove in Bethel Friday November 18th, Lion Joe Rocky explained the “What and How” of the Pediatric Vision Testing program undertaken by the Brookfield Lions in cooperation with the Connecticut Lions Eye Research Foundation and the Lions Eye Health Program. The target group is children in pre-Kindergarten, Kindergarten and First Grade. The reason being is that detection of vision abnormality at an early age gives a higher success rate of correction. The Brookfield Lions, using the WelchAllyn PediaVision SPOT VS100 camera, screens for eye abnormalities such as: Amblyopia (lazy eye); Strabismus (eye misalignment); Myopia (nearsightedness); Hyperopia (farsightedness); Astigmatism (blurred vision); Anisometropia (unequal refractive power). This screening, which takes about 2-5 minutes, is done by using the camera at a distance of about 3 feet from the child without physical contact and without eye drops. The parent receives a printed report of the results including a recommendation referring the student to an eye doctor if appropriate. According to Lion Rocky, the Brookfield Lions have conducted over 1000 pediatric eye screenings at local schools and Day Care Centers with 150 students being referred.

Dr. Marcone explained the “Why” of early pediatric vision testing. What was mentioned was that most of learning is through vision and if the child has difficulty in seeing they will have difficulty in learning. This might not be detected until they exhibit problems learning, paying attention in school, playing sports and the like. A vision test at this time may reveal a condition that could have been corrected early on. As an example of this is Strabismus where the eyes are not aligned with each other causing double vision. The brain will ignore sight from one of the eyes which could lead to Amblyopia or lazy eye and possible permanent loss of vision of that eye.

For further information about this Brookfield Lions program and its many other Volunteer Programs contact Lion Joseph Rocky at josephrocky@charter.net