Normative Data of Higher-Order Aberrations in Healthy Caucasian Eyes and Their Correlation with Age, Gender, and...

To investigate the distribution of normative data for higher-order aberrations (HOA) among younger and older populations and identify their correlations with age, gender, and refractive errors.

This study analyzed healthy, phakic, treatment-naïve eyes from Caucasian participants examined at three European centers between July 2019 and July 2022. Total eye and corneal HOA were analyzed using a novel corneal tomographer with an integrated Hartmann-Shack aberrometer. Simple correlation analysis was conducted using the Pearson correlation coefficient, assuming a linear model.

A total of 1075 eyes were analyzed. Mean age and spherical equivalent (SE) were 52.9 ± 19.5 years (range: 10-91 years) and -1.81 ± 3.76D (range: -17.11-+8.72D). A strong correlation was found between age and ocular RMS HOA (r = 0.55, p < 0.001) and the age-related effect on spherical aberration (SA) was moderate (r = 0.30, p < 0.001). There was a moderate positive correlation between age and corneal RMS HOA (r = 0.46, p < 0.001), horizontal coma (r = 0.28, p < 0.001), and SA at 4-mm (r = 0.39, p < 0.001) and 6-mm (r = 0.55, p < 0.001) zones, indicating that these aberrations increase with age. Weak correlations were observed between SE and ocular SA at 4-mm (r = 0.27, p < 0.001) and 6-mm (r = 0.26, p < 0.001) zones, with SE explaining only a limited proportion of the observed variability. Gender-dependent differences were small but identified between ocular vertical trefoil (p < 0.01), corneal RMS HOA (p < 0.03), horizontal coma (p < 0.001), and oblique secondary astigmatism (p < 0.03).

This large Caucasian cohort demonstrates the distribution of normative HOA data. Significant age, gender, and SE-dependent differences were identified that may be taken into consideration when mitigating HOA in clinical practice.

Our data demonstrates the distribution and normative values of HOA among healthy phakic eyes and may serve as a reference for mitigation of wavefront errors in clinical practice.