Children with intermittent exotropia (XOT) are almost three times more likely than those without the disorder to develop a psychiatric disorder later in life.
A study in this month's Archive of Ophthalmology looked at 183 patients diagnosed with intermittent XOT between 1975 and 1994 and followed them along with age and sex matched controls over an average period of 22 years. Intermittent XOT is a poorly compensated exophoria which becomes manifest often when patients are stressed, tired or drink alcohol.
The researchers found that there is a greater female predisposition to the disorder but among affected males there is a much greater chance of mental illness. Author Dr Brian Mohney (Mayo Clinic, Minnesota) concluded that practitioners should 'consider having the patient seen by a psychiatrist or psychologist to get a baseline examination within the first decade of life and to maybe follow them a little more closely.'
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