Eye Patching for a 3 year old

annetted

hiya
just wondered if anyone has any advice on this.. we have to start patching our 3 year old little boys eye for 3 hours a day for the next 4 months.

how did you find it.. where did you get the eye patches.. had a quick look there on the internet.. there seem to be disposable ones and ones that you use day to day.. what have you found best.

the eye specialist only mentioned disposable eye patches but he did not make any recommendations after that..
any advice would be great.
thanks a million
A

Orion

3M sell them online.

If that's not an option then your eye specialist should know where your nearest supplier is.

January

Pharmacies should have them in stock.

I'd go with the sticky ones rather than a "pirate" style eye patch, he might try to pull that type off.

smileyeyes

Hi,
Our 6 year old boy has been wearing an eye patch since April! Initially he wore it all day 7 days a week! Bit by bit, as he improved, the time he needed to wear it reduced so now he only wears it 2 hours a day for 4 days a week. We have been told that he should be finished with it by Christmas! His vision has improved dramatically and the "Eye Doctor" said that he has had a 90% improvement to date which we and our son are thrilled to bits with!

Our son doesn't mind wearing it, although, he will say the odd day "do I have to wear it today" and I just remind him of how far he has come and that by Christmas he should be finished completely with it! It's part of his routine now I suppose!

I order the patches online from a company in Galway called 'eye2eyedirect'. They are €27 for a box of 50. They are decorated lovely and are approx 5 different designs in each box i.e. dinosaurs, fire engines, racing cars, aliens etc...

I hope this helps?? If you have any other questions or thoughts just fire away:)

wmpdd3

My brother had it when it was younger, I feel it totally changed his personality for the worse. It killed his confidence and he became more withdrawn. He had a lazy eye and after 12 months wearing it there was no change. He was monitored through our but the doctor decided to persevere despite no change. He stopped wearing it just before he was 4 and started school. This was over a decade ago, he wasnt in creche or playschool, just at home so bullying wasnt an issue.

My niece now needs to wear one, she has a turn in one of her eyes due to poor eyesight in one eye. She's on the drops at the moment. She's 3, after what happened to our brother, both me and my sister would like to explore all other options available instead of the patch. I think an operation is the next step.

I would monitor the child really well when they are wearing it for any change in behavior so you could seek counseling early. I know it sounds really stupid to get counseling for such a small change but it can have a major effect of the wearer.

January

Operation may not work, I had it when I was two and I still have the turn in my eye...

Lola92

When I was in school a guy in my class had one, we all thought it was cool and wanted a go

You could get the plain disposable ones from your pharmacy or online and get your little boy to choose some character stickers or similar to put on it. Might make him feel a bit better being involved in the whole thing

annetted

thank you so much for all the information.. my heart did sink a bit when the eye specialist said we had to go down this route. i guess i am afraid that it will change his personality or that someone might say something to hurt his feelings. he is a sensitive little boy..

i have looked on the computer with him and we saw some SpongeBob ones so they were available on an english website so going to order those ones. we will try the disposable ones first and see how we get on..

i do hope the patching works, coz the specialist said that an operation then is the next option..

it is just something new for us to get used off. he wants him and his Daddy to both wear eye patches - so they can be pirates.

do you remember the first day your child wore the eye patch.. did the bump into things etc? you know, you put the patch over the child's good eye and his left eye is pretty weak..

thanks again
best wishes

audi a4 2008

hi,my boy had to have the patches and yes he did hate them but to be fair they do help.
he had the patches for years for a few hrs a day.
but this year he had the operation and man what a difference,operation we were waiting 7 years but they did a great job in the mercy in cork.
and as a poster said above me somewhere there right u must watch there confindince as in some children mine included they do worry what people say.
be firm the patch does work.
best of luck op:)

wmpdd3

January wrote: »

Operation may not work, I had it when I was two and I still have the turn in my eye...

I dont think I have ever met an adult with a turn in their eye, I suppose we jsut thought it was pretty much guaranted that it would work. Relatives of us had 3 daughters that all had the op and it worked. We will have to look further into this.

wmpdd3

My brother did bump into things but he had very bad eye sight, I think now he is + or - 5 in one of his eyes where as my niece is only + 1 or 2 in her eyes.

When he stopped wearing the patches and just wore his glasses he took up hurling which is now his life, but with the patch he never got the hang of it (even though he was only 3!!)

January

wmpdd3 wrote: »

I dont think I have ever met an adult with a turn in their eye, I suppose we jsut thought it was pretty much guaranted that it would work. Relatives of us had 3 daughters that all had the op and it worked. We will have to look further into this.

Mine is really severe, but there's a lot to be said for when they performed the operation on me... I was just two years old. It is corrected with glasses though, so it's only noticeable if I'm tired or not wearing my glasses (which I can't do very often because I can't see without them!).

Hannibal Smith

awww this is a great thread! Our little fella has developed a turn in his eye, we're collecting his glasses tomorrow and if they don't work, he'll need to wear a patch, if that doesn't work it'll be an operation.

Like you OP, my heart sank when the ophthamologist said what we'd have to do, I was hoping we were imagining the whole thing.

I hope the patch works for your lad and he doesn't fight it too much

January

Babies with glasses are so cute.

wmpdd3

True, ita amazing how some toddlers just accept it and wear them without question.

deisemum

My older son had to wear a patch on and off for a number of years. He was in playschool when he first wore them and he wasn't the only child wearing a patch/glasses and the same in primary. I think there were 3 others in his class that wore a patch at different stages and no one passed any comments. He got the patches at his appointments and they didn't cost us anything.

I found it easier to get my son to wear his patch or glasses at playschool and school if he only had to wear them for part of the day as he was distracted with work plus at school he had to work so it made him use the weaker eye.

I had to wear glasses from when I was 11 months old, the old John Lennon type that had loops on the arms that a ribbon went through and was tied in a bow on the top of my head It was the 60's after all.

I had the operation on my eye when I was 4. It's not noticable except when I'm very tired.

annetted

hiya
our little boy is amazing really with his glasses.. after the first 3 days (which was tough going) - he never looked back.. he puts on his glasses without a bother every day..

we are not doing so good with the eye patches thou.. coz we are covering his good eye, he is really struggling going about with the patch on - bumping into things.. he sticks it for a few minutes and then he wants to take it off.

he goes to playschool every afternoon - maybe we could try them there but i would not want to be upsetting him.. hard to know what to do..

what time of day did you find best to do the patching?

good luck to everyone whose children are starting out with glasses.. kids are amazing the way they take to things..
A

Hannibal Smith

annetted wrote: »

we are not doing so good with the eye patches thou.. coz we are covering his good eye, he is really struggling going about with the patch on - bumping into things.. he sticks it for a few minutes and then he wants to take it off.
A

aww the poor little guy! Maybe it takes time for him to adjust?


Our son got his glasses last week and it's no bother to him at all, in fact I'm sure he prefers them because he can see better! But it was no bother getting him to wear them...hopefully we don't have to go down the patch route.

annetted

that is great hannibal that he is getting on so well with the glasses.. the glasses make their vision so much better.. when you go down the patching route you are covering over their good eye, it seems to get a bit tricky then..

wmpdd3

My neice had the first day of the patch today, 6 hrs per day with a review in 4 weeks time. She keeps falling over her left foot, but apart from that she was pretty OK. She can feel her eye lashes sticking to the inside of the patch, or so she says.

At the doctors appointment yesterday they said, when she was seen 1.5 years ago, she had a slight turn in her right eye, but perfect eye sight, after using the glasses for 1 year, she now has a turn in her right and a lazy left eye.

After using the drops for 8 weeks, her eye sight hasn't changed at all.

Its infuriating, but what can you do, just hope there is some improvement in 4 weeks time.

January

Some might find this controversial but I'll give you my POV...

I have a turn in my eye, they gave me glasses when I was 9 months old, patched, operated on when I was two and patched some more. My eye sight has done nothing but get worse since I was first given them. I started out pretty ok at a +2.00 (or thereabouts according to my parents) prescription in both eyes to a +6.50 in the right and a +6.75 in the left.

My daughter is now nearly three years old. She was first given a pair of glasses at 9 months old, no matter what I tried, she would not keep them on. She had a prescription of +4.50 in both eyes at nine months. Nearly two years later (this April in fact) she was brought back to the eye clinic and assessed, her eye sight has gotten better and it was reduced to a +4.00 in one eye and +3.75 in the other, the turn is still there... we're back in the eye clinic next Thursday and we will see what happens, she still will not wear her glasses, just refuses them outright. She seems to be ok, we notice if she's tired that she finds it hard to focus... she never complains about her eyes hurting her...

Maybe the glasses made my eyes worse because they took all the work away from my eyes trying to strengthen themselves and they tried to do it for me... I will be mentioning it to the doctor next week and see if we can maybe just work on patching her without glasses for a while and see how we get on with that... My turn is still there when I don't use my glasses or when I'm tired... the operation did not work to correct it.

wmpdd3

The fist prescription for my niece was about 2 and the new one 1.5 year later is 4 in each eye. Its great to get another persons opinion. She has worn her glasses religiously since the day she got them.

She hated the drops but did it anyway, but she REALLY hates the patches so far. After all the patching etc. my brother is 6 in each eye. Can remember if any of those are plus or minus.

Mom2Be

Hi OP.

My daughter (8 in Jan) has been wearing glasses since she was 4. The vision in her left eye is fantastic but in her right... Pretty much non existant..
We have had to patch her eye for 6 hours a day (not in school as she refused) Its hard work and i wish i could say it was worth it (just my experience)

We would improve by as much as 20%.. Continue to patch but at next appointment back down by 20%.. Heartbreaking!
Then moved onto the drops. Into her good eye to block the vision but the difference was that it was 24 hrs a day blocked..
Same story.. Up but then back down again

Anyway, Back to the patches we are again.. The 6 hours a day is torture and tbh we@re only getting about 3 out of her.. Back to clinic the end of Jan and im pretty sure that will be the end of it as she will be at the age where it is irreversible..

Apologies for the rant when all i meant to say is that we get the patches from the clinic, 3 or 4 boxes at a time. Never charged for them either.

Best of luck with it and i know its hard as u will worry other children will be mean.. But every second child has glasses these days.. And there is 4 kids in my daughters school that i know wear patches.. Sounds like a small number but there are only about 50 students in the school.

My lady is asking for contacts to be like her aunty (at 7yrs of age lol)

Hannibal Smith

Well we went back today. She prescribed stronger lenses and we've to use a patch for 2 hours 5 days a week. She says she doesn't think he'll need an operation...but will need glasses for a good while. Maybe till he's 10.

I expect the patch will be tricky...but I nearly died when she showed us how weak the vision is in his eye!

annetted

Hey, I can't believe I first started posting about this topic in 2011.

We are now patching 6 hours a day and 5 days a week and will be doing so for the next 5 weeks. The eye specialists says this is our last real push at patching.. To be honest it is really tough. he won’t wear the patch to school and that is ok with us.. but that means that he puts on the patch about half 2 until half 8. He finds it really difficult doing his homework with the patch on because he cannot see great.. and then the teacher is making red marks on his homework where he has gone outside the dots for doing his writing.

The eye specialist says it is important that he does his homework with the eye patch on as this will help strengthen his eye.. but to be honest he is struggling and he does be in awful bad form, particularly the last couple of weeks. We are a bit worn down by it really.. it’s a bit of a battle every evening..

I just hope the patching works this time around.. we are patching this past 3 years and with very little improvement..

January

We'll be facing patching my 3 year old soon as her left eye is a lot weaker than her right eye (my nearly 6 year old has never been patched because both her eyes are as weak as each other and glasses seem to correct it).

I'd try encourage him to wear the patch to school, I know it's daunting but teasing does not happen any longer and teachers are quick to nip it in the bud if it does. It means he can get it out of the way early and enjoy the rest of his day without it.

Agrandsoftday

The very first thing I do in the morning is patch my child. It's two hours a day and a lot of the time, the two hours is over before we leave the house.

Hannibal Smith

We've been patching since around the same time as you and he's 5 now. He was never too bad with it...but he's a nightmare now. He really kicksfoff big time. It used to be 2 hours a day but now its one hour. Like the other poster said we do it in the mornings so it's done before he leaves for the day.

But 5 hours a day is an awful long time! Especially if there's been no difference at all in all the years you've been doing it. We see an eye physio and he told us to let him use a phone/tablet/ds game while he's wearing it to force the weak eye to work harder. ..so if you check with your oen specialist as to whether that would work in your case and maybe you could break down patch time into segments. Ie...some computer game time. ..Some colouring time. ..and things like that...before he knows it the time will be up?

Woshy

I had a turn in my eye as a child and wore a patch. It didn't work so I had the surgery when I was 8 and it worked fine.

My little boy is 15 months and myself, my husband and my mother have all noticed a turn in one of his eyes, independent of each other. I said it to the phn at his 12 month check and he's been referred to have it checked out. The appointment is in March 2016 though! ( which apparently is so he is old enough to verbalise what he can see). I'm dreading him having to wear a patch so great to see some successes in this thread, as well as the hurdles we're likely to face.

wmpdd3

wmpdd3 wrote: »

The fist prescription for my niece was about 2 and the new one 1.5 year later is 4 in each eye. Its great to get another persons opinion. She has worn her glasses religiously since the day she got them.

She hated the drops but did it anyway, but she REALLY hates the patches so far. After all the patching etc. my brother is 6 in each eye. Can remember if any of those are plus or minus.

Just to update this, patching has worked for my neice so far, her turn is now classed as just cosmetic. Her eyesight in the turned eye is as good as they think they can get it, she is now 6, so it's irreversible.

In the mean time I've had a son who developed a turn at 13 mts, he has glasses now and his eyesight is equally bad in both eyes. - 4.5 in both eyes I think.

I am dreading patches as we have tried to have his hair cut 4 times and given up as he was nearly in convulsions.

Agrandsoftday

wmpdd3 wrote: »

In the mean time I've had a son who developed a turn at 13 mts, he has glasses now and his eyesight is equally bad in both eyes. - 4.5 in both eyes I think.

I am dreading patches as we have tried to have his hair cut 4 times and given up as he was nearly in convulsions.

How old is your son now?