Keratoconus, myopia, and personality

To determine whether there is an association between keratoconus and personality attributes including obsessionality traits.

We reviewed all charts in the regional contact lens clinic, identifying patients who had attended from January 1997 to January 2000 and had a diagnosis of either keratoconus or myopia of at least 6 diopters. This yielded 289 keratoconics and 149 myopes who were contacted by mail and invited to complete two standardized personality questionnaires (Maudsley Obsessive-Compulsive Inventory and the revised Eysenck Personality Questionnaire). On receipt of consent, questionnaires and an explanatory letter were sent to potential participants.

Completed replies from 118 keratoconic and 75 myopic controls were suitable for analysis after exclusion of patients who returned incomplete data or were deemed unreliable by scoring highly on the lie scale. The only finding between the two groups was that myopes scored higher than keratoconics on the psychoticism scale (p < 0.05). This was a small effect and became insignificant when the Bonferroni procedure was applied.

This study indicated that there is little evidence to suggest that keratoconics differ significantly in personality from a group of moderate to high myopes who also depend on contact lens correction for distance vision. Although myopes showed marginally higher levels of psychoticism than did keratoconics, analysis of the range of personality traits assessed indicates that the differences between the two groups is not significant. The authors could not substantiate the clinical notion of the keratoconic personality.