A Comparison of Perimetric Results from a Tablet Perimeter and Humphrey Field Analyzer in Glaucoma Patients.

PURPOSE: To determine the correlation between the perimetric outcomes from perimetry software Melbourne Rapid Fields (MRF) run on an Apple iPad tablet and those from the Humphrey Field Analyzer (HFA).

METHODS: The MRF software was designed with features including variable fixation and fast thresholding using Bayes logic. Here, we report a cross-sectional study on 90 eyes from 90 participants: 12 had normal optic nerves and 78 had glaucoma with various degrees of visual field loss (41 mild and 37 moderate-severe). Exclusion criteria were patients with worse than 20/40 vision or recent intraocular surgery. The visual field outcomes of MRF were compared against those returned from the HFA 24-2 SITA standard. Participants were tested twice on the MRF to establish test-retest repeatability.

RESULTS: The test durations were shorter on MRF than HFA (5.7 ± 0.1 vs. 6.3 ± 0.1 minutes, P < 0.001). MRF showed a high level of concordance in its outcomes with HFA (intraclass coefficient [ICC] = 0.93 for mean defect [MD] and 0.86 for pattern deviation [PD]) although the MRF tended to give a less negative MD (1.4 dB bias) compared with the HFA. MRF also showed levels of test-retest reliability comparable to HFA (ICC = 0.93 for MD and 0.89 for PD, 95% limits of agreement -4.5 to 4.3 dB).

CONCLUSION: The perimetry results from the MRF have a strong correlation to the HFA outcomes. MRF also has test-retest reliability comparable to HFA.

TRANSLATIONAL RELEVANCE: Portable tablet perimetry may allow accurate assessment of visual field when standard perimetry machines are unavailable or unsuitable.