Westport Lions Dedicated to Vision Screening

WESTPORT – For our fifth consecutive year, The Westport Lions Club returned to the Macomber School to conduct vision screening utilizing an innovative, hand held device called the SPOT™ VISION SCREENER by Welch Allyn.

Several members of the Westport Lions Club along with school personnel conducted screening on Pre-Kindergarten and Kindergarten students during the first week of school.

The SPOT device can increase accuracy of testing and save significant time for school nurses.  Tracey Pereira, RN, Macomber School nurse, noted that screening the same number of students utilizing the traditional letter/numbers (Snellen) chart would have taken considerable time.  The device is especially helpful for screening students who do not read or speak, pre-verbal children or those who speak a different language.

For the screening, the child looks into the device which is equipped with a flashing red, amber and blue light and “chirping bird” auditory cue to attract the child’s attention. Within a few seconds, a series of photos of the child’s eyes using infrared light is taken and analyzed to determine if their vision is “in or out of range”.

Conditions that SPOT can identify include near- and far-sightedness, unequal refractive power, eye structure problems, pupil size deviations, and eye misalignment.  If out of range, parents are notified to do a follow up screening with their eye care provider.

Massachusetts Lions District 33S owns the SPOT VISION SCREENER as part of Lions mission of improving eye health. Lions Club International is the largest all volunteer organization in the world with over 1.4 million members.  Its programs focus on sight, youth support, disaster relief, various humanitarian needs and now diabetes awareness. For more information on Lions Clubs, see www.lionsclub.org.