Effect of orthokeratology on ocular dominance in Chinese myopic children, a 1-year longitudinal study.

PURPOSE: To investigate the impact of orthokeratology on ocular dominance from both qualitative and quantitative perspectives.

METHOD: Thirty-nine myopic children undergoing orthokeratology treatment were enrolled in this 1-year prospective longitudinal study. The hole-in-the-card method, convergence near-point method, and the Gabor-based psychophysical method were employed to determine ocular sighting, motor, and sensory dominance, respectively. Refractive error and axial length were measured and analyzed. Pairwise agreements between ocular dominance tests were compared, and the variation in the ocular dominance index (ODI) before and after orthokeratology wear were assessed.

RESULT: The mean age of participants was 10.92 ± 2.21 years (range 8-16 years), with 19 (49 %) being boys. All ocular dominance tests showed poor consistency with each other at the baseline measurement. After 1 year, changes in sighting, motor, and sensory dominance occurred in 5 %, 31 %, and 46 % of subjects, respectively. No significant difference was found in the absolute value of ODI before (1.20 ± 0.54) and after (1.55 ± 0.91) orthokeratology wear (p = 0.23) in the group with no clear dominant eye at baseline. But for those who had a clear dominant eye at baseline, this value significantly decreased after one year of orthokeratology (p = 0.002).

CONCLUSION

Orthokeratology treatment induced dynamic changes in ocular dominance, especially in sensory dominance, among Chinese myopic children.