Evaluation of glare in normal and pseudophakic subjects

It has been difficult to document the subjective complaint of glare. Devices to quantify this problem include the Miller-Nadler glare tester (MNGT) and the brightness acuity tester (BAT). We used these devices to evaluate a group of pseudophakic subjects (15 eyes with posterior-chamber intraocular lenses) and a group of normal subjects (32 low myopic eyes). A subject's ability to discern contrast with a background glare source is measured as a percentage with the MNGT. The number of lines lost on the Snellen chart as a light is brightened progressively over the line of vision is the BAT score. A Wilcoxon signed-ranks test showed no significant change without correction (SC) to with correction (CC) with the BAT but was significant at P less than .001 with the MNGT. The BAT scores for the normal group CC (mean, 0.59) compared with the intraocular lens group CC (mean, 3.0) with the Mann-Whitney U test showed a statistically significant difference (P less than .001). There also was a difference with the MNGT between normal group CC (mean, 5.1%) and pseudophakic group CC (mean, 8.9%) at P less than .001). These results suggest that pseudophakic subjects have marked visual dysfunction secondary to glare. The BAT, however, showed a more easily quantifiable change unaffected by spectacle correction.