Prevalence and associated factors of visual impairment among adults at Debre Berhan Town, North Shewa, Ethiopia.

Abstract Introduction Visual impairment refers to presenting distance visual acuity worse than 6/18 in either or both eyes. Globally 285 million (4.25%) people had visual impairment and among those 266.4 million were adults. It has become a global challenge that greatly affects the mobility, social participation and the quality of life of the people.Purpose The purpose of this study was to determine the prevalence and associated factors of visual impairment among adults at Debre Berhan town.Methods and materials A community-based cross sectional study was conducted at Debre Berhan town. Data was collected by interview with pre-tested semi structured questionnaire and ocular examinations. The collected data were analyzed by SPSS version 20. Multivariate logistic regression was used to identify the determinant factors and p value less than 0.05 was considered as statistically significant.Result A total of 416 participants were involved in the study with a 98.6% response rate. The prevalence of visual impairment among adults was 16.8% (95% CI: 13.5%-20.2%). Age 40-60years (AOR: 3.04, 95% CI: 1.22-7.58), age>64 years (AOR=12.18, 95%CI: 4.47-33.20), illiterate (AOR=3.02, 95% CI: 1.36-6.72), previous eye trauma (AOR=4.44, 95% CI: 1.64-12.04), family size >5 (AOR: 4.44, 95% CI: 1.43-13.75) and family history of eye problem (AOR=7.02, 95% CI: 1.95-25.22) had statistically significant association with visual impairment.Conclusion Prevalence of visual impairment among adults was found to be a significant public health problem. Older age, illiterate, previous eye trauma, large family size and family history eye problem were positively associated with visual impairment.