Characteristics of discrepancies between self-reported visual function and measured reading speed. Salisbury Eye Evaluation Project Team. (1/745)

PURPOSE: Visual impairment is a risk factor for morbidity in the elderly and is often screened for by self-report. This study evaluates whether there are subsets for whom there is a discrepancy between self-reported and measured function. METHODS: The prevalence of a discrepancy between self-reported difficulty reading a newspaper and measured reading speed was determined in 2520 community-based men and women, aged 65 to 84 years, and the discrepant group characterized by polychotomous regression. RESULTS: Of subjects who reported minimal difficulty reading a newspaper, 10.8% (227/2107) read newsprint-sized text (0.21 degrees) more slowly than 80 words/min, a level previously shown to be necessary for sustained reading. Poor visual acuity, presence of psychiatric symptoms, and less satisfaction with vision were associated with being in the group that read slowly and reported difficulty with reading. Better cognition, better visual acuity, more years of education, white race, and fewer psychiatric symptoms were associated with being in the group that read more quickly and reported minimal difficulty. When reading the text size at which subjects read their fastest, only 2.6% of those with minimal difficulty remained discrepant. These individuals were more likely to have less education, be male, be African American, and have poorer cognitive status than those who did not remain discrepant. CONCLUSIONS: A subset of the elderly population have a substantial discrepancy between self-reported reading difficulty and measured reading speed. In some, this discrepancy may be based on underlying expectations and experiences, and in others it may represent a transition from no visual impairment to visual impairment.  (+info)

Tonic accommodation, age, and refractive error in children. (2/745)

PURPOSE: An association between tonic accommodation, the resting accommodative position of the eye in the absence of a visually compelling stimulus, and refractive error has been reported in adults and children. In general, myopes have the lowest (or least myopic) levels of tonic accommodation. The purpose in assessing tonic accommodation was to evaluate it as a predictor of onset of myopia. METHODS: Tonic accommodation was measured in children enrolled in the Orinda Longitudinal Study of Myopia using an infrared autorefractor (model R-1; Canon, Lake Success, NY) while children viewed an empty lit field or a dark field with a fixation spot projected in Maxwellian view. Children aged 6 to 15 years were measured from 1991 through 1994 (n = 714, 766, 771, and 790 during the 4 years, successively). Autorefraction provided refractive error and tonic accommodation data, and videophakometry measured crystalline lens curvatures. RESULTS: Comparison of the two methods for measuring tonic accommodation shows a significant effect of age across all years of testing, with the lit empty-field test condition yielding higher levels of tonic accommodation compared with the dark-field test condition in children aged 6 through 11 years. For data collected in 1994, mean (+/-SD) tonic accommodation values for the lit empty-field condition were significantly lower in myopes, intermediate in emmetropes, and highest in hyperopes (1.02 +/- 1.18 D, 1.92 +/- 1.59 D, and 2.25 +/- 1.78 D, respectively; Kruskal-Wallis test, P < 0.001; between-group testing shows each group is different from the other two). Age, refractive error, and Gullstrand lens power were significant terms in a multiple regression model of tonic accommodation (R2 = 0.18 for 1994 data). Lower levels of tonic accommodation for children entering the study in the first or third grades were not associated with an increased risk of the onset of myopia, whether measured in the lit empty-field test condition (relative risk = 0.90; 95% confidence interval = 0.75, 1.08), or the dark-field test condition (relative risk = 0.83; 95% confidence interval = 0.60, 1.14). CONCLUSIONS: This is the first study to document an association between age and tonic accommodation. The known association between tonic accommodation and refractive error was confirmed and it was shown that an ocular component, Gullstrand lens power, also contributed to the tonic accommodation level. There does not seem to be an increased risk of onset of juvenile myopia associated with tonic accommodation.  (+info)

Visual function in term infants with hypoxic-ischaemic insults: correlation with neurodevelopment at 2 years of age. (3/745)

AIMS: To determine if there is any association between the findings of visual assessment performed at the age of 5 months and neurodevelopmental outcome at the age of 2 years in children who have sustained hypoxic-ischaemic insults. METHODS: Twenty nine term infants with hypoxic-ischaemic encephalopathy and/or brain lesions on neonatal magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) were prospectively evaluated. At 5 months of age all the infants had their visual function assessed using the Atkinson Battery of Child Development for Examining Functional Vision, which includes the assessments of optokinetic nystagmus (OKN), acuity, visual fields, fixation shift and phase and orientation reversal visual evoked potentials. At 2 years of age the children had a structured neurological evaluation and a Griffiths developmental assessment. RESULTS: There was good correlation between the extent of the early detected visual impairment and both neuromotor and global development. Children with more than three out of five abnormal visual tests at 5 months of age tended to have abnormal neurological examination results and abnormal developmental quotients. Children with three or fewer abnormalities tended to have developmental quotients in the normal range; the level of their performance, however, was still related to the number of visual tests passed. CONCLUSIONS: Individual visual tests can provide important prognostic information. While abnormal OKN and acuity were always associated with abnormal outcome, normal results on visual evoked potentials and fixation shift tended to be associated with normal outcome.  (+info)

Off-axis monochromatic aberrations estimated from double pass measurements in the human eye. (4/745)

Off-axis monochromatic aberrations in the human eye impose limits on peripheral vision. However, the magnitude of the aberrations off-axis, and in particular coma, has not been yet completely determined. We have developed a procedure to estimate third order aberrations in the periphery of the human eye. The technique is based on recording series of double pass retinal images with unequal entrance and exit pupil diameters (Artal, Iglesias, Lopez-Gil & Green (1995b). J. Opt. Soc. Am. A, 12, 2358-2366.) which allows the odd asymmetries in the retinal image be assessed. The procedure that is described provides accurate estimates of the main off-axis aberrations: astigmatism, defocus and coma. We have measured these aberrations in four normal subjects. For a given eccentricity, the measured amount of coma and astigmatism are relatively similar among subjects, because the angular distance from the axis is the dominant factor in determining the magnitude of these aberrations. However, we found considerable variability in the values of peripheral defocus, probably due to a complicate combination of off-axis aberrations and fundus shape. The final off-axis optical performance of the eye for a given object location is determined by a particular mixture of defocus, astigmatism, coma and higher order aberrations.  (+info)

The Bristol Shared Care Glaucoma Study: reliability of community optometric and hospital eye service test measures. (5/745)

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Primary open angle glaucoma patients and glaucoma suspects make up a considerable proportion of outpatient ophthalmological attendances and require lifelong review. Community optometrists can be suitably trained for assessment of glaucoma. This randomised controlled trial aims to assess the ability of community optometrists in the monitoring of this group of patients. METHODS: Measures of cup to disc ratio, visual field score, and intraocular pressure were taken by community optometrists, the hospital eye service and a research clinic reference "gold" standard in 405 stable glaucoma patients and ocular hypertensives. Agreement between and within the three centres was assessed using mean differences and intraclass correlation coefficients. Tolerance limits for a change in status at the level of individual pairs of measurements were also calculated. RESULTS: Compared with a research clinic reference standard, measurements made by community optometrists and those made in the routine hospital eye service were similar. Mean measurement differences and variability were similar across all three groups compared for each of the test variables (IOP, cup to disc ratio, and visual field). Overall, the visual field was found to be the most reliable measurement and the cup to disc ratio the least. CONCLUSIONS: Trained community optometrists are able to make reliable measurements of the factors important in the assessment of glaucoma patients and glaucoma suspects. This clinical ability should allow those optometrists with appropriate training to play a role in the monitoring of suitable patients.  (+info)

Interobserver agreement for grating acuity and letter acuity assessment in 1- to 5.5-year-olds with severe retinopathy of prematurity. (6/745)

PURPOSE: To evaluate interobserver test-retest reliability of the Teller Acuity Card procedure for assessment of grating acuity at ages 1, 2, 3.5, 4.5, and 5.5 years, for HOTV letter acuity at 3.5 and 4.5 years, and for Early-Treatment Diabetic Retinopathy Study (ETDRS) letter acuity at 5.5 years in the multicenter study of Cryotherapy for Retinopathy of Prematurity (CRYO-ROP). METHODS: Subjects were the 73 participants in the CRYO-ROP study who had acuity assessed at one or more ages by two of the seven study visual acuity testers as part of a quality control procedure. All subjects had birth weights of less than 1251 g, and all had severe (threshold) ROP in one or both eyes. RESULTS: For sighted eyes, interobserver agreement for grating acuity (across all five test ages) was 0.5 octave or better in 57% of eyes and 1.0 octave or better in 85% of eyes. Interobserver agreement for letter acuity (3.5-, 4.5-, and 5.5-year test ages) was 0.5 octave or better in 71% of eyes and 1.0 octave or better in 93% of eyes. For all eyes (sighted and blind), Kendall rank correlation coefficients (Tau) were 0.86, 0.83, and 0.94 for grating, HOTV, and ETDRS acuity, respectively. Kappa statistics on data from all eyes indicated excellent interobserver agreement for grating, HOTV, and ETDRS acuity (0.73, 0.80, and 0.84, respectively). Interobserver agreement was not related to age or to severity of retinal residua of ROP. CONCLUSIONS: Excellent interobserver agreement for grating acuity measurements and for letter acuity measurements was obtained. Results suggest that with careful training and implementation of quality control procedures, high reliability of visual acuity results is possible in clinical populations of young children.  (+info)

RPGR transcription studies in mouse and human tissues reveal a retina-specific isoform that is disrupted in a patient with X-linked retinitis pigmentosa. (7/745)

X-linked retinitis pigmentosa (XLRP) is a genetically heterogeneous group of progressive retinal degenerations. The disease process is initiated by premature apoptosis of rod photoreceptor cells in the retina, which leads to reduced visual acuity and, eventually, complete blindness. Mutations in the retinitis pigmentosa GTPase regulator ( RPGR ), a ubiquitously expressed gene at the RP3 locus in Xp21.1, account for approximately 20% of all X-linked cases. We have analysed the expression of this gene by northern blot hybridization, cDNA library screening and RT-PCR in various organs from mouse and man. These studies revealed at least 12 alternatively spliced isoforms. Some of the transcripts are tissue specific and contain novel exons, which elongate or truncate the previously reported open reading frame of the mouse and human RPGR gene. One of the newly identified exons is expressed exclusively in the human retina and mouse eye and contains a premature stop codon. The deduced polypeptide lacks 169 amino acids from the C-terminus of the ubiquitously expressed variant, including an isoprenylation site. Moreover, this exon was found to be deleted in a family with XLRP. Our results indicate tissue-dependent regulation of alternative splicing of RPGR in mouse and man. The discovery of a retina-specific transcript may explain why phenotypic abberations in RP3 are confined to the eye.  (+info)

Outcome of cataract surgery considering the preoperative situation: a study of possible predictors of the functional outcome. (8/745)

AIM: To analyse possible predictors of the self assessed functional outcome of a cataract extraction. METHODS: The patients' self assessed visual function was studied by use of a questionnaire, the "Catquest", before and 6 months after surgery. All patients (n=1933, mean age 75.5 years, 66.8% women) who were undergoing cataract surgery in March 1995, in 35 different departments of ophthalmology participating in the National Swedish Cataract Register, were included in the study. A routine ophthalmic examination was performed before and after surgery. The following preoperative variables were studied with regard to a possible relation to the outcome: age, sex, ocular comorbidity, best corrected preoperative vision (better eye), first or second eye surgery, other diseases with a need for long term medication, need for home help, need for subsidised travel by taxi. RESULTS: Ocular comorbidity was strongly related to a "no benefit" outcome after surgery (p= 0.005). Second eye surgery and young age was related to a "very good benefit" outcome after surgery (p=0.0001 and p<0.0001 respectively). CONCLUSIONS: Patients with an ocular comorbidity in the eye undergoing a cataract extraction were characterised by a significantly higher frequency of deteriorated self assessed visual function after surgery than patients with no ocular comorbidity. The highest degree of improvement was most frequently found in younger patients undergoing second eye surgery.  (+info)

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