Results of Quantitative and Qualitative Assessment of Color Vision in Patients with Congenital Partial Atrophy of the Optic Nerve

Abstract

Background. Congenital partial atrophy of the optic nerve is one of the main causes of blindness and low vision in patients with fundus pathology, and the study of color vision is important in diagnosis and monitoring visual functions in patients with this disease.Purpose: to study the possibilities of using the own developed method of quantitative and qualitative assessment of color vision in patients with partial optic nerve atrophy.Materials and methods. 55 patients aged from 8 to 20 years with congenital partial atrophy of the optic nerve (PAON) with a typical fundus pattern and EFI indicators for this disease were observed. The control group included 116 people of the same age without fundus pathology and with normal visual acuity. To study color vision in both groups, the classic FarnsworthMunsell Dichotomous D15 Test and the own developed method for quantitative and qualitative assessment of color vision were used.Results. The method developed by us made it possible to identify color perception disorders of varying severity in the majority (about 90 %) of patients with PAON. In the control group, no color perception disorders were detected in more than 70 % of the subjects. Quantitative assessment of color vision conducted using the method developed by us demonstrates significantly higher indicators of the total error of perception of color tones in patients with PAON (35.6 ± 3.2 degrees for a better-seeing eye and 39.9 ± 3.3 degrees for a worse-seeing eye) in comparison with the subjects of the control group (6.2 ± 1.1 degrees for a better-seeing eye and 7.5 ± 1.3 degrees for a worse-seeing eye). The severity of color perception disorders in patients with PAON does not depend on age, but has a significant inverse relationship with visual acuity. In the group of patients with PAON, when examining both better-seeing eye and worse-seeing eye, perception disorders of all color tones are detected with a slight predominance of disorders of perception of red, green and blue. The method developed by us has sufficiently higher sensitivity and specificity in comparison with the classic Farnsworth-Mansell D-15 test.Conclusion. The method developed by us makes it possible to effectively carry out a quantitative and qualitative assessment of the state of color perception in patients with PAON.

Keywords

• partial atrophy of the optic nerve
• color vision
• diagnostic methods of color vision