Objective
To define and demonstrate effective cataract surgical coverage
(eCSC), a candidate UHC indicator that combines a coverage
measure (cataract surgical coverage, CSC) with quality (post-operative
visual outcome).
Methods
All Rapid Assessment of Avoidable Blindness (RAAB) surveys with datasets on
the online RAAB Repository on April 1 2016 were downloaded. The most recent
study from each country was included. By country, cataract surgical outcome
(CSOGood, 6/18 or better; CSOPoor, worse than
6/60), CSC (operated cataract as a proportion of operable plus operated
cataract) and eCSC (operated cataract and a good outcome as a proportion of
operable plus operated cataract) were calculated. The association between
CSC and CSO was assessed by linear regression. Gender inequality in CSC and
eCSC was calculated.
Findings
Datasets from 20 countries were included (2005–2013; 67,337
participants; 5,474 cataract surgeries). Median CSC was 53.7%
(inter-quartile range[IQR] 46.1–66.6%), CSOGood was 58.9%
(IQR 53.7–67.6%) and CSOPoor was 17.7% (IQR
11.3–21.1%). Coverage and quality of cataract surgery were
moderately associated—every 1% CSC increase was associated with a
0.46% CSOGood increase and 0.28% CSOPoor decrease.
Median eCSC was 36.7% (IQR 30.2–50.6%), approximately one-third
lower than the median CSC. Women tended to fare worse than men, and gender
inequality was slightly higher for eCSC (4.6% IQR 0.5–7.1%) than for
CSC (median 2.3% IQR -1.5–11.6%).
Conclusion
eCSC allows monitoring of quality in conjunction with coverage of cataract
surgery. In the surveys analysed, on average 36.7% of people who could
benefit from cataract surgery had undergone surgery and obtained a good
visual outcome.