AAPOS Adult Strabismus Committee?s Report on the Status of Adult Strabismus Telemedicine

Purpose: To evaluate the utility of telemedicine in the treatment of adult patients with strabismus.Methods: A 27-question online survey was sent to oph-thalmologists of the American Association for Pediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus (AAPOS) Adult Strabis-mus Committee. The questionnaire focused on the fre-quency of telemedicine utilization, the benefits in the diagnosis, follow-up, and treatment of adult strabismus, and barriers of current forms of remote patient visits.Results: The survey was completed by 16 of 19 mem-bers of the committee. Most respondents (93.8%) re-ported 0 to 2 years of experience with telemedicine. Telemedicine was found to be useful for initial screening and follow-up of established patients with adult strabis-mus, mainly to reduce wait time for a subspecialist visit (46.7%). A successful telemedicine visit could be com-pleted with a basic laptop (73.3%) or a camera (26.7%) or could be assisted by an orthoptist. Most participants agreed that common forms of adult strabismus (cranial nerve palsies, sagging eye syndrome, myogenic strabis-mus, and thyroid ophthalmopathy) could be examined via webcam. It was easier to analyze horizontal than ver-tical strabismus. Among the paralytic forms, sixth nerve palsy was the easiest one to assess. Latent forms of stra-bismus can be partially diagnosed and evaluated using telemedicine, but half of the respondents underlined the importance of in-person examinations in these cas-es. Sixty-nine percent believed that telemedicine could be a low-cost and time-efficient health service solution.Conclusions: Most members of the AAPOS Adult Stra-bismus Committee consider telemedicine to be a use-ful supplement to the current adult strabismus practice.