Posters

Age-related effects in the accommodation response of human eye

Poster Details

First Author: A.Moulakaki GREECE

Co Author(s):    R. Montés-Micó   J. Esteve-Taboada   T. Ferrer-Blasco   D. Madrid-Costa     

Abstract Details

Purpose:

In this study the wavefront aberrations with accommodation were estimated for healthy and cataract eyes, to identify the changes in the optical quality of an aged eye and simulate the effect of cataract in the optics of human eye.

Setting:

University of Valencia, Valencia, Spain.

Methods:

An adaptive optics visual simulator (crx-1, Imagine Eyes) system was employed to measure wavefront aberration. Inducing in to the system the wavefront derived from young eyes and adjusting the Zernike coefficients the aged eyes' aberration was compensated, to proper simulate the vision in patients with cataract. Inclusion criteria were applied to the sample. Young adult individuals (>22 age) with clear intraocular media and no ocular pathology and individuals (>52 age) with cataract severity from 1 to 4 were included. Ten healthy and 10 cataract eyes from 20 subjects were examined. Several trials of a steady stimulus at 10Hz were run per subject lasting less than 1 minute. Visual acuity was assessed using computer-generated Landolt-C optotypes (Freiburg Acuity Test) usually display in the monitor of the system. The Root Mean Square (RMS) of the ocular aberration was calculated by the Zernike coefficients.

Results:

The calculated RMS of the ocular aberration has a positive correlation with ageing. More specifically, in younger eyes the total ocular aberrations were lower than those obtained from the aged eyes. For the accommodation response a rapid decline was anticipated in the slope of the curve, especially for severe cataract cases.

Conclusions:

These results suggest that wavefront aberrations vary among subjects and increase with aging. Furthermore, in cases of negatively affected vision (i.e. cataract), the accommodation response deteriorates with age as the accommodation system make optimal use of its available amplitude and depth-of-focus of the eye. FINANCIAL INTEREST: NONE