Assessment of central and peripheral contrast sensitivity in myopes using Spaeth/Richman contrast sensitivity.

Background: Assessing central and peripheral contrast sensitivity (CS) in myopic patients with varying degrees of refractive error using Spaeth/Richman contrast sensitivity test (SPARCS) and compared it with emmetropic individuals.

Materials and methods: CS of 50 consecutive myopic individuals of varying severity was matched with emmetropes using an online CS test, SPARCS, and Pelli-Robson test. Group comparisons for continuously distributed data were made using analysis of variance (ANOVA) when comparing the groups. A post hoc analysis was also done to compare pairs of each group. SPARCS scores were correlated with age and gender.

Results: Data of 126 eyes, 96 eyes from 50 myopes and 30 eyes from 15 emmetropes, were analyzed. The total SPARCS scores of Groups 1, 2, 3, and 4 were 75.15 ± 9.59, 76.48 ± 7.74, 74.55 ± 7.48, and 86.43 + 5.3, respectively. Univariate ANOVA analysis revealed a statistically significant difference in total SPARCS score distribution in the three subgroups with myopia (P = 0.048) and between all the groups (P = 0.000). No statistically significant difference was seen between the groups when comparing the individual SPARCS scores with either age or gender.

Conclusion: The study concludes that there is a significant difference in the CS in patients with varying severity of myopia and assessing peripheral CS is an important adjunct to central CS.