Tribal Odisha Eye Disease Study (TOES # 2) Rayagada school screening program: efficacy of multistage screening of school teachers in detection of impaired vision and other ocular anomalies.

Purpose: To describe program planning and effectiveness of multistage school eye screening and assess accuracy of teachers in vision screening and detection of other ocular anomalies in Rayagada District School Sight Program, Odisha, India.

Methods: This multistage screening of students included as follows: stage I: screening for vision and other ocular anomalies by school teachers in the school; stage II: photorefraction, subjective correction and other ocular anomaly confirmation by optometrists in the school; stage III: comprehensive ophthalmologist examination in secondary eye center; and stage IV: pediatric ophthalmologist examination in tertiary eye center. Sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV) and negative predictive value (NPV) of teachers for vision screening and other ocular anomaly detection were calculated vis-à-vis optometrist (gold standard).

Results: In the study, 216 teachers examined 153,107 (95.7% of enrolled) students aged 5-15 years. Teachers referred 8,363 (5.4% of examined) students and 5,990 (71.6% of referred) were examined in stage II. After prescribing spectacles to 443, optometrists referred 883 students to stage III. The sensitivity (80.51%) and PPV (93.05%) of teachers for vision screening were high, but specificity (53.29%) and NPV (26.02%) were low. The specificity and NPV, in general, were higher in ocular anomaly detection but varied from disease to disease.

Conclusion: Multistage school screening is rapid and comprehensive in a resource-limited community. Regular training and periodic reinforcement of teachers for vision assessment and other ocular anomaly identification are required for further success of the strategy.