ZERNIKE ASTIGMATISM AND VISUAL PERFORMANCE IN MYOPIC EYES BY RIGID GAS PERMEABLE CONTACT LENSES WEAR

To investigate the effects of rigid-gas-permeable contact lens(RGP-CL)wear on Zernike astigmatism and visual performance in myopic eyes.Methods:A wavefront sensor was used to evaluate Zernike astigmatism for 21 eyes with minimum astigmatism and 18 eyes with moderate astigmatism under three different modes of refractive correction:the RGP-CL,spectacle lens correcting spherical equivalent(SL)and spectacle lens fully correcting spherical error and astigmatism(fSL).Contrast visual acuity was assessed with a VA tester at four contrast levels and two luminance backgrounds.Results:Compared to the SL wear,RGP-CL wear changed the main axis astigmatism(Z_(2)^(2))from
0:09-0:34 to 0.34-0.22 for the minimum astigmatism group,while the contrast VA was improved about 0.05 LogMAR(F=8:06,p<0:01).For the group with moderate astigmatism,significant reduction in Z_(2)^(2)was found for both fSL wear(t=4:78,p<0:001)and RGP-CL wear(t=6:29,p<0:0001).The changes in astigmatism were significantly correlated between the fSL and RGP-CL wears(r=0:897,p<0:0001 for Z_(2)^(-2);and r=0:643,p=0:004 for Z_(2)^(2)).Contrast VA was significantly improved for both fSL and RGP-CL wears and the improvements were significantly correlated between each other for all four contrast levels and two backgrounds.Conclusion:RGP-CL wear induces astigmatism for the eyes with minor astigmatism probably due to a correction of corneal astigmatism and thus a manifesting of the lens astigmatism.For the astigmatic eyes,RGP-CL wear has similar effect on correcting astigmatism as the spectacle lens wear with spherical-cylinder correction and also produces similar visual improvement.