Abstract
Purpose :
To introduce AVIGA, a system to automatically assess individuals with visual impairment from age-related macular degeneration (AMD) using characteristics of eye movements through eye gaze tracking.
Methods :
AVIGA is an intelligent system to assess visual impairment in age-related macular degeneration using eye gaze tracking using a desktop mounted eye tracker (Tobii TX300). This system detects the location of an individual’s gaze in real time while projecting 33 test points sequentially in the visual field relative to the gaze point dynamically, avoiding the need for a static eye fixation point. Eye movement characteristics from the gaze data are then automatically detected and measured by the system. Specifically, the eye gaze excursion during each test is characterized by the convex hull of the path (convex path area) travelled by the detected eye gaze during each projected target point in the visual field. The system is evaluated on eyes from healthy subjects and eyes with AMD-related visual impairment diagnosed clinically. Microperimetry (Nidek MP-1) was used as the gold standard visual field assessment for AMD eyes.
A repetition of the Purpose?
Results :
10 healthy eyes and 10 eyes with visual impairment from AMD were tested using the AVIGA system. The difference between the mean convex path area for healthy eyes (11.2, s=3.01) and that of AMD eyes (53.3, s=21.3) was found to be significant (p<0.05). The Pearson’s correlation coefficient was determined to be 0.73 between the visual field assessment based on seen projected points from the proposed AVIGA system against microperimetry.
Conclusions :
There is a significant difference in the gaze movements between healthy eyes and AMD eyes as assessed by the proposed AVIGA system. Evaluation against microperimetry for AMD eyes showed good correlation with AVIGA. The results suggest that AVIGA could be used as a tool for the detection and monitoring of eyes with AMD.
This is an abstract that was submitted for the 2017 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Baltimore, MD, May 7-11, 2017.