16 month old - eye turning inwards

[Cherryblossom1723]

Has anyone got any experience of their little ones eyes going like this?

I've had a look and apparently its known as esotropia.

My little boy is 16months old and until Thursday had no problem with his eyes. This first happened Thursday evening and now happens a lot throughout the day. If he is focusing on something close you can see his eye slowly walk inwards and then it stays pointing towards his nose for a while before going back to normal.

I've spoken to the opticians who have said to take him to the doctors on Monday and to get him referred to the children's hospital (which I've been warned ill have to push for as apparently they don't like to spend the money on it 😳)

But what can I expect to happen from here? Is there anything I need to be aware of? Will this effect his eyesight? Is there anything I need to mention at the doctors? Am I just panicking over nothing?

Thanks everyone

You need to get a ref to an eye hospital from your GP.

My daughter had it and needed an op followed by glasses. They took it v seriously

Thanks for your reply. Did it take long from referral to being seen at childrens hospital?

No don't think so. She had glasses which corrected it instantly, waiting list for op was a year but that was OK because she had the glasses which stopped it turning

He will need to be referred to the Orthoptist and Ophthalmologist at your local eye department. There are lots of different types of esotropia and very often but not always it is associated with hypermetropia (longsightedness). There GP will refer him I’m not sure who thought they would be resistant to this. He will need to be examined with dilating eye drops for refraction to find out if he needs glasses and to examine the back of the eye. The vast majority of children who develop squints( turn in the eye) at this age have otherwise healthy eyes. Squints can appear quite suddenly but sometimes seem to first be noticed after illness. I am an orthoptist

My left eye turned in like this when I was really young. It was astigmatism, I had an op when I was 3 which was unsuccessful and I've worn glasses ever since - wasn't anything to worry about for me - apart from back in the early 90s there was not a lot of choice in glasses so I looked like a right twat 🤣

What@TheOliveFinchsaid as this was the process. Did turn out to be astigmatism in her case too hence the long life glasses. There was no resistance to this so also not sure why someone said there would be !

Drs first thing tomorrow and make sure they refer you. An eye that was fine but suddenly turns in must be investigated asap.

We have an appointment this morning. Hopefully they refer us

Thank you for this. We have an appointment this morning so hopefully they will refer us. It was a lady at the opticians. She said doctors generally try and refer to highstreet opticians eg specsavers, who can't help. She said they do it as they don't like the amount it costs to refer to hospital.

Strangely enough he has had a bad cold this week.

The optician would refer you to the hospital anyway so it would just delay things, as children with a squints need to be under hospital care. Only a very small percentage of squints have a serious underlying cause so try and remember that.
www.squintclinic.com is a good reliable source of information to tell you a bit more about what to expect, produced by the ophthalmology team in Gloucester.

My 21 year old son had this at same age, it was an astigmatism, had two operations before he was 3 to straighten it, very happy with the result.

My son had this, and we noticed it when he was tired or started reading. Turned out he was massively long sighted in that eye and needed glasses and had to wear a patch on his “good eye” to make the turning eye work harder. He still wears glasses but it rarely does it now.

My dd had a squint that I noticed around 18 months. My HV referred her to the orthoptist at the local hospital and she ended up with glasses as she was long sighted. She also had patching treatment as the sight in the squinting eye was poorer and the patch forced it to work harder. She had an eye op at age 4ish as she still had a noticeable squint with her glasses on.

She was under hospital orthoptist care until around age 7/8 and then we got discharged to a local optician.

Thank you for your help everyone.
The doctors have referred us to the hospital. She said she has done it as an urgent referral with how suddenly it started but she doesn't know how long it will take for us to get an appointment.
Sadly the photo she attached to his referral didn't show his eye anywhere near as bad as it can be so im worried it may get shrugged off and the hospital will deal it to not be urgent