Keeping your child quiet with a computer could wreck their eyesight

Helen Hancock felt the sort of guilt familiar to most working mothers when she left her daughter at a playscheme for much of last year’s school summer holidays.But it was only when she took Rhiannah, ten, for a sight test in September that she realised how right she had been to worry.For after spending several […]

Helen Hancock felt the sort of guilt familiar to most working mothers when she left her daughter at a playscheme for much of last year’s school summer holidays.
But it was only when she took Rhiannah, ten, for a sight test in September that she realised how right she had been to worry.
For after spending several hours a day on computer games, Rhiannah’s vision had deteriorated rapidly over the summer months.
 ‘I asked her optician if he thought it was because Rhiannah had spent so much time on computers while I was working and he said that the increase in her prescription had been so rapid that he couldn’t imagine what else could have caused it,’ recalls Helen. ‘He recommended limiting her access to screens to slow the decline.
‘There were plenty of other things Rhiannah could have done at the playscheme but, given the choice, like a lot of children, she would always opt for computer games.’
The draw of the computer screen is familiar to parents everywhere, but few of us are aware of the physical toll they are taking on our children’s eyes.
‘I felt terribly guilty thinking that I could have prevented the deterioration in Rhiannah’s sight,’ says Helen. ‘While she has worn glasses since she was eight, she now has a prescription of -4.75, more than two whole points worse than it was before last summer. She really struggles to see without her glasses.’
And little Rhiannah’s not alone. Opticians in Britain are reporting an increase in the number of young children they see who are myopic — or short-sighted — and are putting it down to the amount of time youngsters now spend staring at iPads, laptops and smartphones, instead of playing outdoors as previous generations did.
While the majority of diagnoses of myopia in children used to happen around puberty, increasing numbers are needing glasses younger and younger.
And it’s children from comfortable backgrounds who are driving this increase. Why? In part, because they are wealthy enough to have access to all those seductive screens and gadgets, says Joanne Hancox, a consultant in paediatrics at London’s Moorfields Eye Hospital.
‘We are seeing a general trend towards myopia,’ she says. ‘And studies suggest that children from better socio-economic backgrounds are more likely to be affected.
‘It’s also much more common in cities. One of the theories is that children who play outside are less likely to have myopia.
‘Outside you have more cause to look into the distance than inside, where you’re more likely to be doing close-up activities involving reading, writing and screens.’
Laser eye surgeon David Allamby of Focus Clinics has called the condition ‘screen-sightedness’.
‘When myopia or short-sightedness occurs, the eyeball grows from front to back, and becomes egg-shaped instead of round,’ says Mr Allamby.
‘We think this is down in part to genetics, but also because of environmental factors.
‘In other words, if someone with the genes for myopia was spending lots of time outdoors and not looking at a screen, they might never develop myopia at all.’
Experts say children may be particularly vulnerable to this because their eyes are still developing.
 ‘There are a number of factors involved in the increase of myopia, but I have no doubt that the early use of handheld computers play a big role,’ says Dr Maria Liu, head of the new Myopia Control Clinic at the School of Optometry, Berkeley. She explains that if the eyes do a lot of close-up work while they are still developing, they will interpret nearsightedness as ‘the normal state’ and be less efficient at looking at long distances.
This is a big concern for Suzanne Poulter, 39, and husband Paolo Barone, 41, whose son, Teo, has been playing games on his siblings’ phones since he was just two years old.
Teo was diagnosed as short-sighted at the age of three. Aged five, he already measures -4.75 in his right eye and -5.25 in his left.
He spends up to four hours a day playing on his Nintendo Wii, as well as games on his older sister’s smartphone. He has six older siblings, three from each of his parents’ previous marriages, who are aged 11 to 18, and Paolo says that gaming has helped bridge the age gap between them.
 ‘As a parent, it’s the easiest thing in the world to leave children playing games while you get on with other things,’ says Paolo, a security officer from High Wycombe, Bucks.
‘But neither my wife and I, nor any of our older children, wears glasses, and if someone could tell me categorically that Teo is short-sighted because he was introduced to screens at the age of two and spends too much time on them, I would feel very guilty.
‘I don’t want to believe it, but perhaps I’m just shielding myself from the unpalatable truth.
‘I think it’s important that he learns to manipulate a mouse and operate a computer. If I’m honest, I think short-sightedness is a price worth paying for that,’ says Paolo.
A fifth of children under the age of 13 have never had a sight test, although they are free on the NHS, so the problem could be even more widespread than opticians realise.
Antonia Chitty, a trained optometrist, was upset when her son, Jay, was prescribed glasses for short-sightedness aged just six.
Culled from mailonline.co.uk