Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 11, 2026
Binocular Dynamic Visual Acuity in Eyeglass-Corrected Myopic Patients
Published on: March 29, 2022
A comparison of the rate of refractive growth in pediatric aphakic and pseudophakic eyes
S K McClatchey1, E Dahan, E Maselli
1Department of Ophthalmology, Naval Medical Center, San Diego, California 92134-2202, USA. snd2skm@snd10.med.navy.mil
Objective:
To compare the rate of refractive growth in pseudophakic children's eyes to that of aphakic eyes.
Design:
Multicenter, retrospective observational case series.
Participants:
83 patients with pseudophakic eyes (100 eyes) and 74 patients with aphakic eyes (106 eyes), with an age of surgery between 3 months and 10 years and a minimum follow-up time of 3 years or more, depending on the age at surgery.
Methods:
A logarithmic model was used to analyze the rate of refractive growth for each eye.
Main Outcome Measures:
Age at surgery, intraocular lens power, intraocular lens A-constant, initial postoperative refraction, final refraction, and final age.
Results:
Overall, pseudophakic eyes showed a lesser rate of refractive growth than aphakic eyes (-4.6 diopter vs. -5.7 diopter, P = 0.03). This trend was also present but less significant when the eyes were grouped into those less than 6 months of age at surgery (-3.3 diopter vs. -4.6 diopter, P = 0.09) and older patients (-5.0 diopter vs. -6.1 diopter, P = 0.07). However, the mean quantity of myopic shift was greater in pseudophakic eyes than in aphakic eyes (-5.26 diopter vs. -4.54 diopter), despite shorter follow-up times in the pseudophakic eyes. This is due to the optical effects of a constant intraocular lens power in a growing eye.
Conclusions:
Pediatric pseudophakic eyes have a slightly lesser rate of refractive growth than aphakic eyes. The new rate values should be used for predicting future refractions in these eyes.
