Resumen

HERNANDEZ SILVA, Juan R; RIO TORRES, Marcelino  y  PADILLA GONZALEZ, Carmen Ma. Resultados del RACSS en Ciudad de La Habana, Cuba, 2005Results of RACCS in the City of Havana, Cuba, 2005 . Rev Cubana Oftalmol [online]. 2006, vol.19, n.1, pp. 0-0. ISSN 0864-2176.

A RACSS (Rapid Assessment of Cataract Surgical Services) was made on the population aged over 50 years in the City of Havana. A sampling size of 2 760 persons distributed into 46 clusters (family physician's offices), which were randomly selected by a systematic sampling from all the municipalities, was determined. For the estimation of the sample size, we considered the following criteria: expected prevalence rate of blindness of 2.5 %, allowable error of 3 % and design effect of 70 %. Estimated indicators were the prevalence rate of blindness in persons over 50 years by sex, age groups and cause; the prevalence of aphakics and pseudoaphakics, and the coverage and results of cataract surgery. The study had a coverage of 98,3 % of the selected sample. The prevalence rate of blindness was 2,4% in all. The prevalence rate of blind persons by age increases from 2,6 % at 50 years to 15,2 % at 80 years and over. The most important causes of blindness were cataract (50 %), glaucoma(26 %) and diabetic retinopathy (9&). The prevalence rate of cataract-induced blindness by sex was 3,64 % for females and 4,06 % for males, for a total number of 10 184 blind people and 47 529 blind eyes from cataract. The main barriers for cataract surgery were: lack of knowledge about the disease in 4,4 % of cases, waiting for cataract maturation in 17,9 % of cases, and a disease in which performance of this surgery was contraindicated in 11,5 % of cases. In all, 70,7 % of pseudoaphakics or aphakics had visual acuity with correction of 0,3 or more. Generally speaking, 62,3 % of patients had intraocular lens

Palabras llave : blindness; epidemiology; prevention; cataract; glaucoma.