Early screening saves 3k babies from blindness

BENGALURU: A free programme to treat retinopathy of prematurity, started way back in 2008 in Karnataka, has saved 3,000-odd infants from complete blindness, continuing through the lockdown and pandemic, despite challenges.

Retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) is seen in prematurely born babies weighing less than 2 kg, and causes blindness. There are only 200-odd ROP specialists in the country who can treat this, making it difficult for them to travel everywhere. This is when Karnataka Internet Assisted Diagnosis for Retinopathy of Prematurity (KIDROP) was started by Narayana Nethralaya, with which the state government joined hands later.

“It is executed through mobile teams consisting of technicians who go around all districts, make a diagnosis using a specialised digital camera, upload it to a telemedicine platform for ROP specialists to guide them further. If the patient needs care, they are referred to the city or a doctor travels to the district, all within 48 hours, to provide laser treatment,” explained Dr Anand Vinekar, founding Programme Director of KIDRO, which has screened two lakh babies so far.

The screening numbers dropped briefly during the April 2020 lockdown, due to which they decided to quickly work with the local administration and NGOs, get special stickers to allow the mobile teams to travel to the districts and also provide ID cards to the staff. The numbers then went back to the pre-Covid levels, with 4,956 pre-term infants screened. Of them, 232 received treatment between April and December 2020, and 5,412 babies were screened between January and December 2021 of which 258 received treatment.

“The general public does not know that pre-term babies can suffer eye problems. It is the duty of the doctor to check for ROP within four weeks of birth. There are nearly 2.5 lakh babies who need laser treatment in the country, many of whom come late and suffer irreversible blindness,” said Dr K Bhujang Shetty, Chairman & Managing Director, Narayana Nethralaya. He was speaking to the media on World Prematurity Day which is observed on November 17.

As per statistics shared by Dr Vinekar, the incidence of ROP is between 20 and 50 per cent in pre-term babies, of which 5 to 15 per cent require treatment. In Karnataka, the incidence is between 22 and 27 per cent, of which 7.7 per cent need care. He said the model can be emulated across states and is sustainable.
The KIDROP programme is being carried out across 127 neonatal centres in Karnataka. This is the single largest ROP cohort in the world that includes government district hospitals, private neonatal units and medical college hospitals as well.