A cross-sectional study revealed that strabismus was moderately associated with some mental health disorders among children. The study analyzed medical claims data from a commercial healthcare payer system from 2007 to 2017.

The study conducted by Stacy Pineles, of the University of California Los Angeles, and colleagues, published in JAMA Ophthalmology, included a total of 12,005,189 participants aged 18 years and below. Among them 352,636 children had strabismus and 11,652,553 children had no eye disease diagnoses. The average age was 8 years. The data revealed that esotropia was the most common type of strabismus (n=184,005), followed by exotropia (n=163,439) and hypertropia (n=43,987). Strabismus was reported to be associated with a higher risk for developing mood disorders, schizophrenia, and anxiety compared to children without any eye disease, with an adjusted odds ratio of (aOR) 2.01 for anxiety disorder, aOR 1.83 for schizophrenia, aOR 1.64 for bipolar disorder, and aOR 1.61 for depressive disorder.

It was not clear whether the type of strabismus had any connection with the magnitude of mental illness risk. (Medpage Today, March 10, 2022)