Abstract
Purpose :
Purpose: The development of effective therapies for nonadvanced age-related macular degeneration (AMD) has been hindered by a lack of sensitive, reversible endpoints to be used in clinical trials. Many clinical reading tests (e.g., MNREAD) use a relatively small number of words (10-20) and yield highly variable estimates of a patient’s reading rate (1). Our group developed a novel reading test, Ora Reading Passages™ test, that assessed patients’ reading efficiency algorithm under mesopic vision conditions, for naturalistic reading at low and high contrast. This study reports results from a third longitudinal visit for a cohort of non-advanced AMD patients tested in 2017.
Methods :
Methods: Nine non-advanced AMD patients with visual acuity of 20/25 or better from the original cohort (2017) and 16 matched controls returned for the third visit. During a single study visit, all participants completed a battery of visual function tests including the Ora Reading Passages™ test. In the Ora Reading Passages™ test, patients viewed four naturalistic reading passages from National Geographic Education (5th-7th) grade-reading levels, presented at low and high contrast levels. Patients were asked to read aloud a passage of text at a comfortable reading pace.
Results :
Results: Patients with non-advanced AMD had significant algorithmic efficiency differences for the passages in ‘Reading Artifact 05’ at both low and high contrast background levels (p < 0.0077). ‘Reading Silk Road 08’ (p = 0.057) and Reading Coral 14(p = 0.0611). Results showed consistent patterns of observable data across our longitudinal study (1).
Conclusions :
Conclusions: The Ora Reading Passages™ test, which assesses the algorithmic efficiency of reading in contrast levels (low - high) for mesopic vision conditions, demonstrated significant differences between non-advanced AMD patients and matched controls. These differences have remained relatively consistent over a 3-year longitudinal period. Our results suggest a repeatable test that can serve as a reliable and reversible functional endpoint in future clinical trials for therapies aimed at treating nonadvanced AMD.
This abstract was presented at the 2022 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Denver, CO, May 1-4, 2022, and virtually.