Purpose: To determine prevalence of refractive error in school going children in Faisalabad District, Pakistan

Methods: Descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted in 14 public and private schools of Faisalabad in 6 months duration from December 2018 to June 2019. 600 volunteers of both sex and age ranging between 4-15 years were studied through non-probability convenient sampling technique. Visual acuity was tested from Snellen at 6- meter distance. Retinoscopy was performed on each patient for objective analysis. Test was performed after taking complete ocular, medical, surgical and drug history. Visual acuity, extra-ocular movement, eye examination and cycloplegic refraction were done. Each eye was tested monocular and each subject was tested thrice.

Results: Our study included total 600 subjects (100%) from which 370(61.67%) were males and 230(38.33%) were females. Prevalence of refractive errors in school going children of Faisalabad showed that prevalence of myopia is high i.e 390(51.5%) than 220(36.7%) emmetropia and 71(11.8%) hypermetropia was in children.

Conclusion: Refractive errors are more common in school going children of Faisalabad, Pakistan. Most common refractive error seen in children was myopia than other refractive errors. Myopia is greatest public health problem for children of Faisalabad community and need of the hour is to establish mobile school camps and awareness sessions in youngsters to save ocular and related problems.