Effectiveness of Therapy for the Treatment of Accommodative Insufficiency: An Open Pilot Study

Background: To evaluate improvements in clinical measures and symptoms in children and young adults with accommodative insufficiency in an open trial of office-based vergence and accommodative therapy. Methods: Major eligibility requirements included ages 9 to 30 years and amplitude of accommodation (AA) ≥2 diopters (D) below Hoffstetter’s minimum. Participants completed 8 weekly, 1-hour sessions of office-based vergence and accommodative therapy. Therapy procedures followed the Convergence Insufficiency Treatment Trial (CITT) therapy protocol with emphasis on accommodative procedures. Clinical measures of accommodation and symptoms (Convergence Insufficiency Symptom Survey [CISS]) were assessed at baseline and after therapy. Results were evaluated using the Student’s t test and Kruskal-Wallis test. Repeatability of CISS scores at baseline was assessed using Bland Altman 95% Limits of Agreement (LoA) and Interclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC). Results: Eighteen participants (mean age 17.4 ± 8.0 years) were enrolled; sixteen completed the study. The mean AA improved significantly from 5.5D OD and OS at baseline to 12.4D OD and 12.8D OS at outcome (p<0.001). Mean monocular accommodative facility (AF) also increased significantly in both eyes from 6.6 cycles per min (cpm) OD and 7.4cpm OS at baseline to 14.2cpm OD and OS at outcome (p≤0.0009). Amplitude-scaled monocular AF also showed significant improvements (p≤0.034 for both). Mean CISS score improved 10.50 points (p=0.0003). Significantly greater improvements in AA were observed in children (9.0D) than in adults (4.3D) in the right eye (p=0.007 for both comparisons). Conversely mean improvement in CISS score was significantly greater in adults than in children (p=0.039). Repeated CISS scores differed by, on average,1.47 points (95% limits of agreement:-5.19, 8.13; p=0.12). The ICC was 0.95 with a 95% confidence interval of 0.87 to 0.98. Conclusion: Eight weekly sessions of office-based accommodative vergence therapy combined with homebased- reinforcement therapy resulted in improvements of symptoms and clinical measures of accommodation in children and young adults with accommodative insufficiency.