Accommodation response in hypermetropic anisometropia (ARIHA Study)
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Accommodation response in hypermetropic anisometropia (ARIHA) study: accommodation changes during amblyopia treatment and pilot residual amblyopia treatment study
IRAS ID
336117
Contact name
Holly Geraghty
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Sheffield
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 11 months, 30 days
Research summary
Anisometropic amblyopia is when one eye has a much stronger glasses prescription than the other, causing poor vision in one eye, even with glasses, because the brain favours the better-seeing eye.
With standard care treatment (glasses plus either patching or atropine drops given to the better seeing eye), 35% of children with anisometropic amblyopia do not have any significant visual improvements, and will have reduced vision in one eye for life. There is no consensus for the reasons why some children do not respond as well as others.
Recent research using the Plusoptix PowerRefractor (PR3), which quickly measures eye focusing (accommodation), suggested that in children with anisometropic amblyopia, the focusing of the amblyopic eye might influence treatment success. However, such measurements weren't previously common due to equipment limitations in clinics.
We aim to use the non-invasive PR3 to assess accommodation in hypermetropic anisometropic amblyopia, at the University of Sheffield. This will be a two-phase study of children aged 4-10 years who have hypermetropic anisometropia. We will recruit participants attending the Ophthalmology Department at Sheffield Children’s NHS Foundation Trust (SCH). We will take repeated measurements of accommodation at points during standard care treatment (phase 1) and conduct a pilot intervention study (phase 2) to determine whether adjusting glasses prescriptions based on accommodation responses with amblyopia treatment can improve vision in the weaker eye. The goal is to gather evidence to inform a future larger multicentre RCT to improve the visual outcomes for anisometropic amblyopic children in the future.
REC name
Yorkshire & The Humber - Bradford Leeds Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
23/YH/0290
Date of REC Opinion
21 Dec 2023
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion