Annual Myopia Progression and Subsequent 2-Year Myopia Progression in Singaporean Children

Abstract

Purpose: To investigate the association between 1-year myopia progression and subsequent 2-year myopia progression among myopic children in the Singapore Cohort Study of the Risk Factors for Myopia.

Methods: This retrospective analysis included 618 myopic children (329 male), 7 to 9 years of age (mean age, 8.0 ± 0.8) at baseline with at least two annual follow-up visits. Cycloplegic autorefraction was performed at every visit. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves from multiple logistic regressions were derived for future fast 2-year myopia progression.

Results: Children with slow progression during the first year (slower than -0.50 diopter [D]/y) had the slowest mean subsequent 2-year myopia progression (-0.41 ± 0.33 D/y), whereas children with fast progression (faster than -1.25 D/y) in year 1 had the fastest mean subsequent 2-year myopia progression (-0.82 ± 0.30 D/y) (P for trend < 0.001). Year 1 myopia progression had the highest area under the curve (AUC) for predicting fast subsequent 2-year myopia progression (AUC = 0.77; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.73-0.80) compared to baseline spherical equivalent (AUC = 0.70; 95% CI, 0.66-0.74) or age of myopia onset (AUC = 0.66; 95% CI, 0.61-0.70) after adjusting for confounders. Age at baseline alone had an AUC of 0.65 (95% CI, 0.61-0.69).

Conclusions: One-year myopia progression and age at baseline were associated with subsequent 2-year myopia progression in children 7 to 9 years of age.

Translational relevance: Myopia progression and age at baseline may be considered by eye care practitioners as two of several factors that may be associated with future myopia progression in children.

Keywords: age at baseline; children; myopia; progression.