Exposing your baby's eyes to sunrays not treatment for jaundice, practice is outmoded — Optometric

The Ghana Optometric Association (GOA) has revealed that exposing the eyes of babies suffering from jaundice to sun rays in the mornings by 10:00 hours is dangerous.

The practice is now outmoded and seen to be problematic.

Studies has established that the children ended up with other conditions including sunburns as the sunrays were now dangerous due to environmental changes which had depleted the ozone layer which used to protect humans from the direct effect of being exposed to the sun.

Parents must report jaundice symptoms early to the hospitals for treatment, less severe jaundice cases in neonatal were often treated using light therapy by putting the babies under UV lights at the hospital and being monitored, Dr. Alfred Gardemor, GOA Public Relations Officer stated at the fifth Ghana News Agency-Tema Regional Office and the Ghana Optometric Association fortnightly public sensitization initiative “GNA-GOA: My Eye! My Vision!

The fortnight initiative is a collaborative public education advocacy campaign to promote the need for people to access eye care and also to draw attention to vision health was monitored by the Communication for Development and Advocacy Consult at Tema.

The GNA-GOA: My Eyes! My Vision! The initiative also seeks to challenge the public and policymakers to focus on vision as a health issue, which forms a critical component of mankind’s wellbeing but is often neglected.

Dr Gardemor, therefore cautioned parents with babies suffering from jaundice against exposing the babies’ eyes to the rays of the sun as a way of treatment such practices could expose the eyes of babies to Ultraviolet (UV) radiation and its resultant effects may be dangerous.

Speaking on the topic; “Children’s Vision and Eye Health”, Dr. Gardemor, who is also a Senior Optometrist at the Nsawam Government Hospital stressed that the neonatal jaundice that is the yellow discoloration of a newborn baby’s skin and eyes, occurred because the baby’s blood contained an excess of bilirubin which is a by-product of the breakdown of red blood cells.

Dr. Gardemor indicated that because the liver of a newborn was not fully developed, it could not get rid of the excess waste (bilirubin) generated from the breakdown of the red blood cells which ended up affecting the skin and eyes and could also affect some other organs including the brain.

Touching on other eye conditions children could suffer from, he mentioned amblyopia also known as lazy eye, allergies, refractive errors, and glaucoma among others.

He said many children with eye disorders were yet to be identified and treated, this he said affected their learning and education as it could lead to learning disorders.

Dr Gardemor, therefore, advised parents to get a first eye screening for their children from age six months, with a second one at age one, three, before pre-school and periodically to avoid future conditions and to detect any anomalies early for correction as some of the condition could not be corrected with time.

Mr. Francis Ameyibor, GNA-Tema Regional Manager explained that the two professional bodies have agreed to work together on a public sensitization campaign dubbed: “GNA-GOA: My Eyes! My Vision” to draw attention to vision health.

“We are combining the forces of our professional calling as Optometric Physicians and Communication Experts to reach out to the public with a well-coordinated message.

“We believe such collaboration would serve as a major platform to educate the public on vision health and also serves as a critical stage for the association to reach out to the world,” Mr. Ameyibor noted.