What You Need to Know About Myopia Control

As a 2015 graduate from the Southern College of Optometry, Dr. Brett O’Connor joined Pullen Eye Care on a mission.  Specialty practices are an excellent way of growing patients for young associate doctors, but no specialty is more in our wheelhouse as ODs than prescribing for refractive error.  With the rate of myopia dramatically increasing in the US and worldwide, Dr. O’Connor is an advocate that myopia control shouldn’t be relegated to just a specialty or niche clinic offering.  It’s a core fundamental to who we are as optometrists and our mission to correct sight and protect the health of our patients’ eyes.  So how can you get started on offering myopia control in your practice? 

Start with knowing what works and what doesn’t work and be able to share that information with patients.

What Doesn’t Work:

Bifocal or progressive glasses don’t have statistically significant impact on myopic progression.

RGP (rigid gas permeable) contact lenses do not slow myopic progression.

Undercorrecting myopic prescriptions may even increase the rate of progression!

What Does Work:

Atropine:  The ATOM 2 Study showed diluted 0.01% atropine had comparable myopic control to higher concentrations, but statistically significant less side effects.  It was well tolerated by patients (minimal accommodative change, limited photophobia), and had less risk for rebound effect when treatment was stopped.

Soft Multifocal Contact Lenses: Distance center multifocal contact lenses slow myopia progression by an average of 50%.

Orthokeratology: Overnight orthokeratology wear has been shown to slow myopic progression between 50-90% depending on the study.

Executive bifocals with base in prism in the near segment may slow progression.  The base in prism with bifocal performed better at myopia control than bifocals alone.

Thinking about starting a myopia control focus in your practice?  You can reach out to Dr. O’Connor via LinkedIn for more advice!