Association of Gender, Ethnicity, Blood Group with Visual Acuity and Colour Vision Among Undergraduate Medical Students: Cross Sectional Study
[1]
Samarathunga Arachchige Uvindu Indira Karunarathna, Faculty of Medicine, Melaka Manipal Medical College, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Melaka, Malaysia.
[2]
Hewage Methsithini Mandakini Rodrigo, Faculty of Medicine, Melaka Manipal Medical College, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Melaka, Malaysia.
[3]
Viniitha Jagatheesan, Faculty of Medicine, Melaka Manipal Medical College, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Melaka, Malaysia.
[4]
Durgeswary Keecha, Faculty of Medicine, Melaka Manipal Medical College, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Melaka, Malaysia.
[5]
Kisshan Pathmanathan Thiruchelvam, Faculty of Medicine, Melaka Manipal Medical College, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Melaka, Malaysia.
Introduction: For medical students and healthcare professionals, detection of certain clinical signs required unimpaired visual acuity and colour vision. We conducted this study to find the prevalence of visual acuity and colour vision defect and its association with gender, ethnicity, blood group, BMI among undergraduate medical students. Methods: The general objective of this study is to find the association between gender, ethnicity and blood group on visual acuity and colour vision among undergraduate medical students of Melaka Manipal Medical College. A total of 104 volunteers (of any age, both genders, of Malay, Chinese, Indian ethnicities) were asked to answer an online questionnaire followed by measurement of height, weight, visual acuity (Snellen’s Chart) and colour vision (series of 24 Ishihara plates) by the researchers. Results: In the study we carried out, students with blood group A were 1.3 times, blood group B were 2.4 times, and blood group O were 1.1 times more likely to have defective visual acuity compared to the AB Group. The underweight group was 1.5 times more likely to have defective visual acuity compared to the normal, while both overweight and obese groups were 2.4 times more likely chance. The males were 0.6 times more likely to have defective visual acuity as compared to females. The Chinese group was 1.8 times while Indian group was 1.6 times more likely to have Defective visual acuity compared to Malay group. Conclusion: Our study elicited that there is no association of gender, ethnicity, blood group, BMI with visual acuity & colour vision among undergraduate medical students.
Visual Acuity, Colour Vision, Blood Groups, Body Mass Index, Ethnicity, Gender
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