title: Effect of Vision Therapy on Accommodation in Myopic Chinese Children.
abstract: Introduction. We evaluated the effectiveness of office-based accommodative/vergence therapy (OBAVT) with home reinforcement to improve accommodative function in myopic children with poor accommodative response.Methods. This was a prospective unmasked pilot study. 14 Chinese myopic children aged 8 to 12 years with at least 1 D of lag of accommodation were enrolled. All subjects received 12 weeks of 60-minute office-based accommodative/vergence therapy (OBAVT) with home reinforcement. Primary outcome measure was the change in monocular lag of accommodation from baseline visit to 12-week visit measured by Shinnipon open-field autorefractor. Secondary outcome measures were the changes in accommodative amplitude and monocular accommodative facility.Results. All participants completed the study. The lag of accommodation at baseline visit was 1.29 ± 0.21 D and it was reduced to 0.84 ± 0.19 D at 12-week visit. This difference (-0.46 ± 0.22 D; 95% confidence interval: -0.33 to -0.58 D) is statistically significant (p< 0.0001). OBAVT also increased the amplitude and facility by 3.66 ± 3.36 D (p= 0.0013; 95% confidence interval: 1.72 to 5.60 D) and 10.9 ± 4.8 cpm (p< 0.0001; 95% confidence interval: 8.1 to 13.6 cpm), respectively.Conclusion. Standardized 12 weeks of OBAVT with home reinforcement is able to significantly reduce monocular lag of accommodation and increase monocular accommodative amplitude and facility. A randomized clinical trial designed to investigate the effect of vision therapy on myopia progression is warranted.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Ophthalmology, Zhongshan Ophthalmic Center, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510060, China.
authors.forename: Martin Ming-Leung
authors.initials: MM
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.affiliation: Pennsylvania College of Optometry, Salus University, Philadelphia, PA, USA.
authors.forename: Mitchell
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Scheiman
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Ophthalmology, Zhongshan Ophthalmic Center, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510060, China.
authors.forename: Cuiyun
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Su
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Ophthalmology, Zhongshan Ophthalmic Center, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510060, China.
authors.forename: Xiang
authors.identifier: 0000-0002-9551-9408
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Chen