Prevalence of retinopathy of prematurity in a urban based tertiary hospital in central India

Background: Retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) is an important cause of preventable blindness in children. It is a serious and underestimated complication of prematurity treatment among preterm and low-birth weight babies and is preventable cause of blindness unless recognized and treated early. Objective: The objective of this study was to estimate the prevalence of ROP in preterm infants and low-birth weight in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) of a tertiary hospital and to increase the awareness of early screening of ROP among parents and doctors. Materials and Methods: A ROP prospective screening survey was performed enrolling all prematures and low-birth-weight Neonates delivered at Index Medical College Hospital & Research Centre from July 2018 to June 2021, with a gestational age of 37 weeks or less at birth and a birth weight of 1700 g or less. One Hundred and Eighty Six(186) preterm infants (i.e.372 eyes) were included for ROP screening .Out of these 186 preterm infants (372eyes), Forty eight (48)preterm infants (i.e.96 eyes) developed Retinopathy of Prematurity. Descriptive statistics included the mean and standard deviation for numerical variables, and the percentage of different categories for categorical variables.