The eye is a complex structure requiring several small muscles and features to work together. Among these are the six tiny but essential muscles. These muscles attach to the eyes and help in controlling eye movement.

Typically, these muscles receive signals from the brain and then contract or relax as needed so that both focus on the same object and in the same way. However, a malfunction in these muscles can cause the eyes to turn out, in, down, or up in a condition called strabismus.

What Is Strabismus?

Another name for strabismus is crossed eyes, a condition where the eyes fail to align. When you have this condition, maintaining eye alignment is challenging, and it affects the quality of your vision and may cause other conditions.

Eye misalignment affects depth perception, can cause double vision, and may lead to future vision issues in the affected eye. When you have misaligned eyes, your brain receives two very different images from your eyes, which may lead to double vision.

To remedy this incongruence, the brain will ignore the image from the affected eye so that you can see clearly. But as the ignored eye continues to become more inactive, it results in permanent vision reduction in one eye, a condition called amblyopia.

Forms of Strabismus

Sometimes, a baby can seem to have strabismus because when you look at them, their eyes seem to be looking in different directions. However, they are looking in the same direction, and this appearance of misalignment is called false or pseudostrabismus. This may occur due to a wide nose bridge or excess skin that covers the corner of the eye, and it disappears as the child grows.

Strabismus comes in four primary forms:

• Hypertropia or upward turning

• Hypotropia or downward turning

• Exotropia or outward turning

• Esotropia or inward turning

What Are the Causes and Risk Factors of Strabismus?

Strabismus may occur due to several main reasons, issues with nerve signals to the eye, the control center of the eye muscles in the brain, or malfunctioning of the eye muscles.

Genetics

You are more likely to have the condition if someone in your family also has it.

Refractive Errors

Hyperopia or farsightedness is a common cause of the condition primarily because of the increased stress from trying to focus.

Medical Conditions

If your child has some conditions like cerebral palsy or Down syndrome or you have had a traumatic brain injury or a stroke, you are at a greater risk of developing the condition.

Common Forms of Strabismus

Accommodative Esotropia

This is much more common in people with hyperopia due to the stress on the focusing system. This system is connected to the system that controls the direction of sight, and the pressure to focus can translate to malfunction in the system that controls eye direction.

Intermittent Exotropia

Individuals with this form suffer from eyestrain, difficulty reading, and headaches and may close one eye to see better. It occurs when one eye looks farther than the other and when it is difficult to coordinate both eyes.

For more on all you need to know about strabismus, visit Raleigh Eye Center at our offices in Raleigh, Durham, Reidsville, North Carolina, or South Hill, Virginia. Call (919)876-2427 to book an appointment today.