Background: During the rapid physical and mental development, school-age children, who are beginning the learning phase, have an increasingly heavy burden on their eyes.
Objectives: The aim of this study was to analyze the association of refractive errors with body height in children aged 7-14 years.
Material and methods: A total of 1,696 children aged 7-14 years were consecutively enrolled. Children's age, sex, height, uncorrected and corrected visual acuity were collected. Children's refractive errors were tested using static retinoscopy, and converted to the spherical equivalent refraction. The prevalence of refractive errors in different height groups were measured.
Results: The children were divided into an ultra-low-height group, a low-height group, a high-height group and an ultra-high-height group as per the height standard of children aged 3-16 years generally used in China. With the increase of body height, the prevalence of myopia was also increased, which was 39.2% in the ultra-low-height group, 46.3% in the low-height group, 49.1% in the high-height group, and 58.0% in the ultra-high-height group. Most of the myopic children suffered from low myopia. Results from the regression analysis showed that there was no difference in the prevalence of myopia between the high-height group and ultra-high-height group (p = 0.145), but it was increased significantly proportionately to the increase of body height (p < 0.001).
Conclusions: The prevalence of myopia exhibits an increased tendency with height development in children aged 7-14 years. Additionally, school-age children often develop low or moderate myopia rather than high myopia.
Keywords: height; refractive error; school-age children.