THE GYROSCOPE CONTACT LENS AND CORNEAL DIOPTER PLOT

a report at a meeting of the New York County Optometric Society, April 11, 1956, describing the principle and design of his newly developed contact lens Summary 1 A new scientific principle for the design of contact lenses for each individual eye based on obtaining a “Corneal Diopter Plot” for each eye—a measurement of the average radius of curvature in two principal meridians at each of the five zones of the cornea where the lens rests (see illustration). 2 A new elliptically contoured precision contact lens varying in shape to correspond to the individual data of the Corneal Diopter Plot. This “shaping” by truncating the ellipse to correspond to the “high and low” points of the Plot, insures that the lens will maintain its equilibrium over the pupillary area even under the dynamic forces of free eye and lid movements. This equilibrium prevents the edges from impinging on the blood vessel-fed area of the limbus surrounding the cornea and so interfering with normal physiology. 3 This new lens weighs .0003 ounces and is .004 inch thick. It is made to conform to the physiological needs of a correcting lens resting continually against living tissue, by the addition of metacrylic acids to the plastic substance. This insures both increased porosity and hardness and yields excellent optical properties to correct all errors of refraction.