Has your child ever had an eye exam under sedation?

[LoveBWVVBR]

After our second unsuccessful attempt at getting our 2 year-old DD's eyes examined this morning, her eye Dr. is now going to do the exam in the hospital under sedation. It's my understanding that this will be done under nitrous or something similar and not under general. It's a 5 minute procedure. I called DD's ped. and he was comfortable with it...he said that it's actually pretty common to do it in this age group Has anyone on here actually had a child who needed their eye exam done under sedation, and was it really no big deal? Thanks.

FWIW, my DD has had surgery under general anesthesia with no ill effects before (ear tubes/adenoids), but that was totally necessary. I'm really scratching my head wondering if we should just wait it out until she can cooperate through an eye exam. She almost definitely needs glasses and that is causing some slight eye crossing, though.

 

[DoeWDW]

My daughter was born with cataracts, so she had many eye exams from 5 weeks of age on. She never had to be sedated but she was so used to the eye exams that she was always cooperative.

If there are any issues with your child's vision, I'd get the exam done. It's hard to put a price on good vision. My eyes (I also had cataracts at birth) now "wander" permanently because I had cloudy vision for too long and my eyes kept searching for something to focus on.

Best wishes!

 

[LoveBWVVBR]

Thanks for responding! My gut feeling is to go through with the exam under sedation too. Her eye Dr. said that if she does have strabissimus (sp?), we caught it early. He thinks that it might be due to the fact that she needs glasses. He also said that it was unusual for a 2 y.o. to be nearsighted, but that he thinks that my DD is. DH and I don't have great vision, so I think it was inevitable that DD would need glasses this early. I just hate that this has to be done under anesthesia, but DD's ped. had a point about this being the best way to make absolutely sure that her perscription was correct.

 

[dcgrumpy]

Not for an eye exam but my 2yo DD did have a cat scan under sedation. She was only out for a few minutes. It was probably very similar. She was fine a couple of minutes after 'waking up'.

She actually loved the sedation. When they first injected her she started swaying and saying "wheeeeee".

 

[tlens]

If her eyes are crossing, I would absolutely have it done. LEft unchecked there is a possibility this could lead to blindness in the weak eye by the age of 7.

My son, age 3, has a similar condition although his eyes do not cross so without a very thorough eye exam it would not be caught. When using both eyes his vision is EXCELLENT. With the good eye covered, his vision is only 20/60. By 7 he may have been legally blind in that eye that could not be corrected with glasses. He just got his first pair of glasses. The short of it is that the brain has difficulty dicifering the differences in vision and as it gets worse, the brain shuts off the receptors to that eye.

When we see the dr again next month, if the glasses haven't helped, we will begin patching the good eye.

2 is a great age to catch this and correct it with less effort than if she were older. Don't wait.

 

[RSoxFan]

Since she has an eye problem, I would definitely want it done. If the docs were saying it was a routine thing, I would wonder. But eye crossing is something that is best adressed ASAP.

 

[kejoda]

Our oldest had coates diease(leaking blood vessals in the eye). He had 4 exams that way and 6 eye surgeries. The only problem he had was dairy. As long as we avoided dairy for 24 hours there wasn't any problems.

Go for the surgery. Its the best way for them to find out what her script needs are.

 

[LoveBWVVBR]

Since she has an eye problem, I would definitely want it done. If the docs were saying it was a routine thing, I would wonder. But eye crossing is something that is best adressed ASAP.

Her eye crossing isn't something that you'd just notice offhand. It's VERY rapid, and nobody even believed me that it was happening until one of my friends happened to see DD do it. That's why DD's eye Dr. thinks that we caught it really early. To me, it looks like one eye is much stronger than the other and that that causes problems when she tries to focus. I guess we'll find out for sure during the eye exam under sedation.

I'm also worried that she will refuse to wear her glasses. She won't keep sunglasses on for more than 30 seconds, so I know that the glasses will be a battle.