Comfort and vision with silicone hydrogel lenses: effect of compliance.
OBJECTIVE
Silicone hydrogel (SH) lenses are usually replaced after 2 weeks (2W) or 1 month (1M); however, many patients do not comply with the manufacturers' recommended replacement frequency (MRRF). The purpose of this analysis was to investigate the effect of compliance with MRRF on comfort and vision in SH wearers.


METHODS
As a part of a larger study investigating compliance with MRRF, patients were asked to rate their subjective comfort and vision from 0 (very poor) to 10 (excellent) in the morning, at the end of the day (EVE), when lenses were new, and needed replacing (NR).


RESULTS
One thousand three hundred forty-four patients wore 2W replacement modality (2WR) (n = 717) or 1M replacement modality (1MR) (n = 617) SH lenses. Comfort and vision in the morning and when lenses are new were significantly higher than for EVE and NR (p < 0.001). Twenty-nine percent (95% confidence interval 25.3-32.4) of 1MR and 59% (95% confidence interval 55.5-62.7) of 2WR wearers were non-compliant with the MRRF. Compliance had a significant effect on EVE (p = 0.002, p = 0.008) and NR (p < 0.001, p < 0.001) comfort and vision. After accounting for compliance, EVE and NR comfort and EVE vision were higher for 1MR than 2WR (p = 0.015, p = 0.044, p = 0.019).


CONCLUSIONS
Compliant patients had better EVE and NR comfort and vision than non-compliant patients, regardless of replacement modality. Optimal subjective performance with SH lenses seems to be facilitated by replacing lenses as recommended.
Dumbleton
Kathryn
K
Centre for Contact Lens Research, School of Optometry, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. kdumble@uwaterloo.ca
Woods
Craig
C
Jones
Lyndon
L
Richter
Doris
D
Fonn
Desmond
D
D003262:Contact Lenses, Extended-Wear; D003263:Contact Lenses, Hydrophilic; D003625:Data Collection; D006801:Humans; D010349:Patient Compliance; D014785:Vision, Ocular / Q000502:physiology*; D014796:Visual Perception