Abstract
Purpose
Benign essential blepharospasm (BEB) generally is considered a disorder of adults; however, it rarely can present in childhood or adolescence. The main purpose of this study was to determine the prevalence of BEB in children and adolescents. Our research question was whether blepharospasm is seen in children or adolescents as well as in the adult population.
Methods
We conducted a retrospective chart review at the University of Utah and Johns Hopkins University. We reviewed our databases for diagnoses of blepharospasm and tic disorder over the past 10 years in patients of all ages. Charts then were reviewed to confirm the diagnosis, and a questionnaire was sent to subjects whose blepharospasm had apparently begun before age 20 years.
Results
We identified 26 patients diagnosed with eyelid spasms that had begun while under the age of 20. We confirmed BEB in four of these cases. Of these individuals, all had developed symptoms in adolescence or before and all were still symptomatic but had noted improvement in the severity and frequency of their symptoms.
Conclusions
Although rare, BEB can develop in the first decade of life, producing symptoms and signs that are similar to adults, with persistence into adulthood.
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Acknowledgments
Susan Schulman assisted with editing and manuscript preparation.
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Funding
This study was supported in part by an unrestricted grant from Research to Prevent Blindness, Inc., New York, NY, USA, to the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT, USA.
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The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Ethical approval
All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committees and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.
Informed consent
Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study. Additional informed consent was obtained from all individual participants for whom identifying information is included in this article.
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Video Legend: Thirteen year old boy presented after several years of forceful squeezing of his eyelids that is involuntary. Triggers include bright lights and objects coming toward his face. The patient controls the involuntary squeezing by touching his lateral eyebrow and eyelid. He is still having symptoms but has had improvement using FL-41, taking breaks during reading/near tasks, and avoiding movie theaters. At the end he is demonstrating his sensory trick for reading. (WMV 5408 kb)
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Kinard, K., Miller, N.R., Digre, K.B. et al. Blepharospasm in children and adolescents. Childs Nerv Syst 32, 355–358 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00381-015-2938-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00381-015-2938-5