An audit of the cataract surgical outreach programme in Litein in 2008

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate the outcome of cataract surgical services offered by the University of Nairobi outreach programme in AIC Litein Hospital. Methodology: Retrospective hospital-based survey of the records of all patients who underwent cataract surgery in AlC Litein Hospital in 2008. Questionnaires were filled . frompatients' records and the data was analysed using SPSS 17.0. Results: There were seven outreach visits in 2008 with an average of 33 surgeries carried out during each visit. There was a high rate ofloss of patients to follow up which limited the analysis. Post operative visual acuity did not meet WHO standards as more than 5% of the cases had visual acuity worse than 6/60. The commonest intra-operative complication was posterior capsule tear with vitreous loss (14%). The commonest early post-operative complication was corneal oedema and the commonest late complication was posterior capsular opacity. The leading cause of poor outcome was refractive error. Conclusions: Poor patient follow up may have contributed to the apparent poor outcome as it is likely that only the patients with problems came back for review. Patient follow up could be improved by visiting the patients in their homes and accurately recording their post-operative examination. The surgeries were associated with a high rate of intraoperative complications and the post-operative visual outcome did not meet WHO standards. The outcome could be improved by availability of accurate biometry and a wide range of intraocular lenses.