Abstract
Purpose:
This study aims to propose and verify a novel protocol called Autoacuity Test for fast vision screening among pre-school children.
Methods:
991 children (3 to 6 years) from 7 kindergartens were tested with both the ETDRS Chart and Autoacuity Test. Of these children, 234 were randomly selected to re-examine. All subjects were examined to exclude other ophthalmic problems. The Autoacuity Test was conducted using a computer generated randomly located checkerboard testing objects of variable spatial frequencies against an identically illuminated background shown on a display, where visual acuity was defined as logarithm of the minimal view angle of the square size that the subject could detect the object.
Results:
The mean ages of the subjects is 4.6 ± 1.8 years, the testability for the Autoacuity Test and ETDRS chart is 93.6% and 98.5%, respectively. The mean visual acuities were 0.27 ±0.22 for the Autoacuity Test and 0.23 ± 0.22 for the ETDRS test, respectively. The limit of agreement between the Autoacuity Test and the ETDRS Chart was (-0.30, 0.22). And about 90% of visual acuity biases between two methods were within 0.20 log units. Bland-Altman plots suggested that 95% of visual acuities measured by the test and retest would differ within 0.25 log units(for Autoacuity Test). The intraclass correlation coefficient and its 95% CI for the test-retest was 0.495(0.392, 0.586) for the Autoacuity.
Conclusions:
The Autoacuity Test has fair test-retest repeatability and good concordance with ETDRS chart. The Autoacuity test is a good candidate method for fast vision screening among children.
Keywords: 754 visual acuity •
709 screening for ambylopia and strabismus •
757 visual development: infancy and childhood