Cephalometric Differences between Healthy People and People with Functional Impairment of Visual Acuity at the Age of 17-20

The prevalence of visual acuity disorders in the human population worldwide causes a variety of studies of this problem, including the use of modern means of medical imaging and morphometry. An indication of the anomalies of sight from the point of view of constitutional features and somatotype can be considered as a sign of the last two decades, but the work on cephalometric analysis of morphofunctional parameters of the eye is almost absent, despite the fact that this aspect of the problem has a fairly long history. The purpose of the research is to study the cephalometric differences between healthy people and people with functional impairment of visual acuity at the age of 17-20. Materials and methods. 107 persons aged 17-20 (32 men and 75 women) were divided into two groups: the first one comprised 57 people with normal visual acuity, and the second included 50 people with functional disorders (refraction violation). Based on the obtained data of 17-20 years old healthy people's cephalometric parameters and those with functional vision we have determined definitive indexes (for healthy) and informative morphological indicators to assess the risk of visual disturbances. Results and discussion. Among the 17 year-olds, there were significant (at a level not less than p <0,05) cephalometric features that are informative in relation to the formation of visual acuity disorders. They are: lower morphological height of the face, lower physiognomic height of the face, distances tragion-subspinale, tragion-subspinale distances and tragion-sellion distances and, respectively, reduction of the nasal index. A smaller longitudinal head diameter, smaller noseband height, smaller nose width, lower tragion-sellion distance were identified among the 18 year olds together with the main index increase. Among the 19 year-olds, we identified the following cephalometric features: growth of the minimum forehead width, increase in its height, increase of the external and internal inter-channel distances, increase the distance of the sellion-front temporal and tragion-sellion distances, as well as a significantly larger facial index. Among the 20 year-olds, the cephalometric features that were as follows: increased head cross-diameter and its maximal girth, increase in the face physiognomic height and an increased maximum forehead width, an increase in the internal inter- distances, as well as distances tragion-sellion, tragion-subarea distance, and larger values of the fronto-mandibular index. Conclusions. The research proved that there is a difference between cephalometric parameters for each age group in relation to forming their functional disorders of visual acuity. The study helped determine the most significant cephalometric parameters for each age group (from 17 to 20), taking into account the individual peculiarities of ontogenetic development. The determined cephalometric parameters should be used in the system of screening-risk assessment and early diagnosis of functional visual impairment. Prospects for further research are related to the study of morphological parameters of eyeballs in people with different cephalotypes and correlation interactions between them.