[To a relationship of the clinical course of myopia to the specific features of the physical development of children and adolescents].

Two hundred and seventy-six school children (552 eyes) with mild myopia and 340 with emmetropia (a control group) were examined. In addition to the conventional ophthalmological studies, the authors monitored blood pressure, by measuring mean systolic and mean diastolic pressures and using rheoencephalography, color Doppler mapping of orbital vessels, anthropometry, and somatotyping. The studies established a relationship between the progressive pattern of acquired myopia and the poor physical development of children and adolescents (30% or more muscle bulk reductions as compared with that in children with stabilized myopia in the control group). Systemic hypotension and lowered and insufficient cerebral and blood flow were ascertained to contribute to progressive myopia.