This article is more than 5 years old. Information may no longer be current.

Repeated FDT testing decreases sensitivity, study finds

Add topic to email alerts

Receive an email when new articles are posted on

Please provide your email address to receive an email when new articles are posted on .

Subscribe

Added to email alerts

You've successfully added to your alerts. You will receive an email when new content is published.

Click Here to Manage Email Alerts

You've successfully added to your alerts. You will receive an email when new content is published.

Click Here to Manage Email Alerts

Back to Healio

We were unable to process your request. Please try again later. If you continue to have this issue please contact customerservice@slackinc.com.

Back to Healio

HALIFAX, Canada — Repeated testing with frequency doubling technology perimetry results in a loss of sensitivity, researchers here found. Refractive error also decreases the sensitivity of the test, they reported.

Refractive errors should be corrected and immediate retesting avoided to optimize the performance of frequency doubling technology (FDT) perimetry, the researchers said.

Paul Artes and colleagues at Dalhousie University performed six consecutive tests with FDT perimetry in each of two sessions on one eye each of 12 patients with glaucoma and 11 normal control subjects. The mean deviation in the patients with glaucoma was –2.5 dB, with a range of +0.5 to –4.3 dB. In session one, blur was induced randomly using trial lenses; in session two, the effects of repeated testing were measured.

FDT sensitivities decreased with blur (by < 0.5 dB/D) and with repeated testing (by about 2 dB between the first and sixth tests). Blur and repeated testing independently led to larger numbers of locations with significant total and pattern deviation. Sensitivity reductions were similar in the two groups.

The study is published in the February issue of Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science.