Do People with Developmental Disabilities Experience Vision Changes that Are Different From Those That the General Population Experiences?
There has been little research on the changing health of the eyes of older adults with developmental disabilities. This may be due, in part, to the fact that the presence of increasing numbers of older people with developmental disabilities is a recent phenomenon. Findings from the scant research that have been conducted have indicated that there are many adults with developmental disabilities who have strabismus (eye muscle imbalances) and large refractive errors (nearsightedness, farsightedness, and astigmatism). The prevalence of cataracts and keratoconus (a disease marked by the swelling and scarring of the cornea) have varied by study, and have been reported as high as 50% and 30%, respectively. It is known that adults with Down syndrome are at greater than normal risk for eye disorders, and that age-related disorders seem to occur for them at an earlier age than for other older adults.
