Indigenous eye health measures 2018

Measure 3.1: The number of hospitalisations for diseases of the eye and adnexa, per 1,000 Indigenous population.

Hospitalisations reflect both the occurrence in the population of eye conditions which are serious enough to require hospitalisation, as well as access to and use of hospitals services.

• In 2015–17, there were around 8,300 hospitalisations for Indigenous Australians for diseases of the eye—a crude rate of 5.6 per 1,000 population.
• For Indigenous Australians, the most common principal diagnosis for hospitalisations for diseases of the eye was disorders of the lens (3.4 per 1,000).
• Between 2007–09 and 2015–17, the age-standardised hospitalisation rate for diseases of the eye for Indigenous Australians doubled from 5.4 to 11.4 per 1,000, while the rate for non-Indigenous Australians increased from 10 to 14 per 1,000.
• Rates of hospitalisations were higher among Indigenous Australians than non-Indigenous Australians for those aged 45 to 54 (6.8 and 6.1 per 1,000, respectively) and 55 to 64 (21.1 and 19.5 per 1,000, respectively).