Skip to main content
 
Notice: Users may be experiencing issues with displaying some pages on stanfordhealthcare.org. We are working closely with our technical teams to resolve the issue as quickly as possible. Thank you for your patience.
Stanford Health Care

Risk factors for corneal ulcers: a population-based matched case-control study in Nepal

Risk factors for corneal ulcers: a population-based matched case-control study in Nepal BRITISH JOURNAL OF OPHTHALMOLOGY Byanju, R., Kandel, R., Poudyal, B., Bhandari, S., Ligal, A., Pradhan, S., Gautam, M., Shrestha, P., Sah, R., Gonzales, J. A., Porco, T. C., Whitcher, J. P., Srinivasan, M., Upadhyay, M., Lietman, T. M., Keenan, J., O'Brien, K. S., Village-Integrated Eye Worker Tria 2023; 107 (12): 1771-1775

Abstract

We aimed to examine risk factors for corneal ulcer in a rural and peri-urban setting in Nepal.This population-based matched case-control study was nested in a cluster randomised trial in 24 village development committees in Nepal. Incidence density sampling was used to match incident corneal opacity cases to controls, matching on time of opacity, age, sex and location. Cases and controls were invited to participate in a survey of risk factors for corneal ulcer. Risk factors were evaluated using conditional logistic regression to account for matching.Of the 540 participants with incident opacities identified in the trial, 433 were willing to participate in this substudy and matched to a control. Compared with controls, cases had lower odds of having any education vs no education (adjusted OR, aOR 0.60, 95% CI 0.39 to 0.94), working in non-manual labour occupations vs manual labour occupations (aOR 0.64, 95% CI 0.42 to 0.95) and preferring medical shops for ocular trauma versus eye care system centres (aOR 0.58, 95% CI 0.37 to 0.92). Cases had higher odds of protective goggle use versus no protection (aOR 3.8, 95% CI 1.3 to 11.0) and having an ocular injury vs none (aOR 7.7, 95% CI 4.3 to 13.6) compared with controls.We found ocular injury, manual labour and lower education to be strongly associated with the development of corneal ulcer. Given the persistent burden of corneal blindness in this area, prevention efforts could target efforts to increase access to care in areas where these factors are common.

View details for DOI 10.1136/bjo-2022-322141

View details for Web of Science ID 000865498900001

View details for PubMedID 36202599

View details for PubMedCentralID PMC10076439