Visual results after early surgical treatment of unilateral congenital cataracts.

The authors reviewed the records of 25 consecutive patients who had been operated on for unilateral congenital cataracts at 1 year of age or younger and who had been followed for a period of 5 years or longer. Excluded were patients who demonstrated retinal and optic nerve anomalies. Five eyes achieved 20/40 or better Snellen visual acuity, 5 eyes achieved 20/50 to 20/100 visual acuity, and 15 eyes had 20/200 or less visual acuity. All patients with visual acuity of 20/40 or better had cataract surgery performed before 17 weeks of age, the critical period, and surgery was scattered within this time frame. For surgery performed between 17 weeks and 1 year of age, the best achieved visual acuity in children with surgically significant unilateral congenital cataracts was between 20/50 and 20/100. There was no correlation between the age at the time of surgery and the attainment of these visual levels in this patient subset.