CHICAGO, Nov 12 (Reuters) - Nursing home patients often are overlooked when it comes to taking basic steps to improve their vision, leading to a decline in their quality of life and problems such as depression, U.S. researchers said on Monday.

Optical services tend to be unavailable to residents of nursing homes for several reasons, according to the research by Cynthia Owsley and colleagues at the University of Alabama, Birmingham.

One factor is a pervasive attitude among care givers, family members and others that new or upgraded eyeglasses won't do any good for those who are already mentally or physically impaired, they said.

The study looked at nearly 200 residents of 17 nursing homes in the Birmingham area. Some were given glasses a week after a vision checkup and others got them two months after their exams.

The group that received glasses first reported higher scores for general vision, reading, activities and hobbies and social interaction as well as fewer depressive symptoms in two months compared to the group still waiting for glasses.

"This study implies that there are significant, short-term quality-of-life and psychological benefits to providing the most basic of eye care services -- namely, spectacle correction -- to older adults residing in nursing homes," concluded the study published in the Archives of Ophthalmology.

The findings are significant, the researchers said, because nursing home residents in the United States and other industrialized nations are up to 15 times more likely to have vision problems than people of the same age who live independently.

This is in part because those with poor vision are more likely to be admitted to nursing homes, and those in need often lack transportation or escorts to eye clinics, the report said.

At the same time, doctors who offer eye care services at nursing homes are in short supply, and only 12 percent of U.S. nursing homes have optometric services on-site, the report said. (Reporting by Michael Conlon; Editing by Andrew Stern and Xavier Briand)

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