A Convenient and Robust Test to Quantify Interocular Suppression for Children With Amblyopia.

Hui Chen,Zhifen He,Zhiyue Dai,Xiaoxin Chen,Yunjie Liang,Danli Lin,Jiawei Zhou,Yu Mao,Meiping Xu,Jinling Xu,Xinping Yu

doi:10.1177/2041669519864971

Abstract

Interocular suppression was quantified by the interocular luminance difference that was needed when the two eyes were balanced in discriminating a black–white stripe formed butterfly stimulus, which was dichoptically presented through polarized glasses. Stronger interocular suppression was found in amblyopes than that in controls at both the near (33 cm, 0.95 ± 1.00 vs. 0.14 ± 0.18, p < .001) and far (5 m, 2.18 ± 0.97 vs. 0.24 ± 0.16, p < .001) viewing distances. The interocular suppression in amblyopes was significantly correlated with the interocular visual acuity difference, the visual acuity of amblyopic eye, the Worth-4-Dot test, and the stereo acuity at both the near and far distances (for all cases, p < .001). Our new test enables convenient and robust measurements of interocular suppression in children with amblyopia. The measured interocular suppression is in agreement with other clinical measures.

Highlights

Amblyopia is a neurodevelopmental disorder of the visual system resulting from disruption to binocular visual experience during early childhood
The two eyes of amblyope could be balanced in binocular combination if the luminance in the fellow eye was attenuated to some degree. This phenomenon can be accounted for by the luminance modulated contrast-gain control model. These results suggest that the depth of imbalanced interocular suppression can be quantified by the interocular luminance difference that is needed to balance the two eyes during binocular viewing
The interocular suppression measured in a group of amblyopes was significantly correlated with other clinical measures, such as the visual acuity of amblyopic eye, interocular visual acuity difference, Worth-4-Dot test and stereo acuity

Summary

Introduction

Amblyopia is a neurodevelopmental disorder of the visual system resulting from disruption to binocular visual experience during early childhood. It affects about 3% to 5% of the population and is one of the most common causes of monocular visual impairment (Attebo et al, 1998; He et al, 2004; Holmes & Clarke, 2006). There is evidence that antisuppression training (Hess, Mansouri, & Thompson, 2010b, 2011; Kelly et al, 2018) or optical treatment (Gao et al, 2018; Wang, Feng, Wang, Zhou, & Hess, 2018) benefits binocular and monocular vision in amblyopia. Interocular suppression has been thought to play a primary role in amblyopia (Hess, Mansouri, & Thompson, 2010a), this idea has been disputed (Bossi et al, 2017)

Methods

Results

Conclusion