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Summer 2024
Summer Research
WRITTEN BY:
Nora Matland
Christina Wentz, OD ’24 and her mentor, Janis Winters, OD ’91 conducted research focused on commercially available blue light blocking filters, anti-reflective coatings and lenses that combined both. They compared this to a control lens with no coating or filter on it. 28 subjects completed pursuit, saccade, and fixation assessments using the RightEye Dynamic Vision test. These subjects also completed a 20-minute reading task while wearing various lenses and then filled out an eyestrain symptom questionnaire. Although they found some marginal difference in terms of pursuits (pursuits p = 0.04, control/AR pursuits p = 0.02), for all other assessments (saccade, fixation assessments, reading speed and eyestrain) they found that there was no statistical difference between any of the filters or combinations of them in terms of their effect on digital eyestrain.
If you want to learn more about this research, Christina published her findings in Optometry & Visual Performance, 12(2). 2024. She had two poster presentation at the American Academy of Optometry and Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology; won the National Eye Institute Travel Grant to ARVO in 2022 and also received two travel grants from ICO for ARVO and AAO. She will now be continuing her education as a resident at Rochester Regional Health/Reed Eye Associates.
Rachel Breliant, OD ’24 and her mentor, Yi Pang, OD, PhD studied the effect of low-dose atropine. 46 children, aged 6 to 17, were given low doses of atropine at a 0.01%, 0.03%, 0.05% concentration. Then they measured how these dosages affected children’s vision to see far and near, their binocular vision measurements, and the pupil dilation. What they found was that all three concentrations of atropine eye drops have no significant effect on accommodation, binocular vision measurements, or visual acuity compared to the control group. Even at higher dosages, it is safe to use all three concentrations of atropine for children.
One note: clinicians may ask if distance or near vision is reduced by using low-dose atropine. Based on Dr. Breliant’s and Dr. Pang’s research, they found low-dose atropine has no effect on near or distance vision.
Rachel published her findings in Optometry & Vision Science 2023, 100(8):550-556. She had three poster presentations at the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology and one poster presentation at American Academy of Optometry. She won the VCS Morton W. Silverman Outstanding Paper-Project Award at the American Public Health Association in 2023. At ICO, she was awarded the Darrell G. Schlange, O.D. Scholarship for Excellence in Pediatric Optometry in 2023 and received the Dr. Len Messner and Stephanie Messner Research Award in 2024. She received three travel grants from ICO for ARVO (2022, 2024) and AAO (2022). She will now continue her education through a residency at the Jesse Brown VA Medical Center.
Manisha Parikh, OD ’24, and her mentor, Yi Pang, OD, PhD studied dry eyes in the pediatric population. In this instance, they looked at meibomian gland atrophy and meibomian gland tortuosity and then examined risk factors which included Body Mass Index (BMI), outdoor time, screen time, and diet to see how the onset of these diseases correlated to the above risk factors.
They found that high BMI, reduced outdoor time and an unhealthy diet were significant risk factors. Surprisingly, they did not find any correlation between screen time and the onset of these diseases. They also found that meibomian gland atrophy and meibomian gland tortuosity is very prevalent in children. Severe meibomian gland atrophy (score ≥2) was found in 31.0% of participants in at least one eyelid. Severe meibomian gland tortuosity (score ≥2) was found in 84.0% of participants in at least one eyelid.
Manisha’s findings will be published in Optometry & Vision Science. She had two presentations at American Academy of Optometry and provided two abstracts for the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology journals, she won the National Eye Institute Travel Grant to ARVO in 2022, the Knights Templar Eye Foundation Travel Grant to ARVO in 2022, the VCS Morton W. Silverman Outstanding Paper-Project Award at the American Public Health Association in 2022, and the Dr. Newton K. Wesley Ortho-K Award at ICO in 2023. She also received two travel grants from ICO for ARVO and AAO. She will now go on to apply her research in a private practice setting.
ERRATUM:
In the ICO Matters Winter 2023’s Research Highlight we originally stated that the research was led by Jaymeni Patel, OD ’16. Dr. Patel was the first author of her paper. However, the project was a collaboration between many faculty members. This research was conducted as part of a preliminary study focusing on tele-optometry by Christina Morettin, OD; Harneet Randhawa, OD ’16; Jaymeni Patel, OD ’16; Heather McLeod, OD ’06; Elizabeth Wyles, OD; Navjit Sanghera, OD; Valerie Kattouf, OD ’95; Leonard Messner, OD; Kimberly Fazio, OD ’21 and Yi Pang, OD, PhD.