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A Survey to Identify Screen Test Usage by Certified Orthoptists Across the United States of America
Michelle S Attzs1, Alex Christoff1
1The Krieger Children's Eye Center, Wilmer Eye Institute, Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, Maryland.
Purpose:
To ascertain the use of screen tests for assessing strabismus under binocular viewing conditions by certified orthoptist colleagues around the United States of America.
Methods:
A link to an online survey was distributed to all 440 registered members of the American Association of Certified Orthoptists in early 2022. A total of 135 certified orthoptists responded.
Results:
Of the 135 respondents, 51% were from a public practice, 36% were private practice and 13% from a mixture of both. A large proportion of respondents did not use binocular screen tests to measure strabismus such as the Lancaster red/green test (85%) or Hess screen test (93%), although one respondent reported using the Harms screen test. Most respondents reported using single or double Maddox rods (75%), synoptophore (44%) and prisms (14%) in their practice to quantify strabismus clinically.
Conclusion:
There is limited use of screen tests in private and public practice in the USA. The ergonomic requirements of such tests are prohibitive to their implementation in modern clinical practice.
