Assessing Visual Function & ADL Performance in Patients With AMD

Researchers recently evaluated the relationship between visual function assessments and binocularly performed ADL task tests in patients with age-related macular degeneration (AMD). In a prospective casecontrol study, Claire L. Peterson, MBBS, FRCOphth, and colleagues matched a cohort of 36 patients with AMD to healthy controls. In both better- and worse-vision eyes, monocular best-corrected visual acuity was moderately associated with binocular reading speed and moneycounting tasks. For patients with AMD, moderate correlations occurred between worse-vision eye visual function assessments (contrast sensitivity, mean retina sensitivity, lesion area on OCT, and lesion sensitivity on microperimetry) and ADL task tests (reading, money-counting, and drink-making). In the better-vision eye, there were fewer significant correlations between visual function and ADL performance. In healthy controls only, there were significant correlations between binocular ADL task tests and function measures, such as binocular bestcorrected visual acuity and contrast sensitivity. While monocular best-corrected visual acuity remains a cornerstone of visual function assessment in AMD, contrast sensitivity and microperimetry testing also had significant associations with ADL performance and may be used as complementary measures, Peterson and colleagues concluded.