Optical aberrations in professional baseball players
Received 2 April 2009; received in revised form 16 September 2009; accepted 21 September 2009.
Purpose
To determine the presence, type, and size of optical higher-order aberrations (HOAs) in professional athletes with superior visual acuity and to compare them with those in an age-matched population of nonathletes.
Setting
Vero Beach and Fort Myers, Florida, USA.
Methods
Players from 2 professional baseball teams were studied. Each player's optical aberrations were measured with a naturally dilated 4.0 mm pupil using a Z-Wave aberrometer and a LADARWave aberrometer.
Results
One hundred sixty-two players (316 eyes) were evaluated. The HOAs were less than 0.026 μm in all cases. Spherical aberration C(4,0) was the largest aberration with both aberrometers. There were small but statistically significant differences between the aberrometers in mean values for trefoil C(3,3) and C(3,−3) and secondary astigmatism C(4,2). Although statistically significant, the differences were clinically insignificant, being similar at approximately 0.031 diopter (D) of spherical power. A statistically significant difference was found between the professional baseball players and the control population in trefoil C(3,−3). These differences were clinically insignificant, similar to 0.071 D of spherical power.
Conclusions
Professional baseball players have small higher-order optical aberrations when tested with naturally dilated pupils. No clinically significant differences were found between the 2 aberrometers. Statistically significant differences in trefoil were found between the players and the control population; however, the difference was clinically insignificant. It seems as though the visual system of professional baseball players is limited by lower-order aberrations and that the smaller HOAs do not enhance visual function over that in a control population.
Financial Disclosure
No author has a financial or proprietary interest in any material or method mentioned.
From the Southern California College of Optometry (D.G. Kirschen), Fullerton, Jules Stein Eye Institute (D. G. Kirschen), David Geffen School of Medicine, UCLA, Los Angeles, and Stanford University School of Medicine (M.P. Kirschen), Palo Alto, California; Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary (Laby), Department of Ophthalmology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts; University of Houston College of Optometry (Applegate), Houston, Texas; and Indiana University School of Optometry (Thibos), Bloomington, Indiana, USA
Corresponding author: David G. Kirschen, OD, PhD, 428 South Brea Boulevard, Brea, California 92821, USA.
Alcon, Inc., Ft. Worth, Texas, USA, donated the LADARwave system and Ophthonix, Inc., San Diego, California, USA, donated the Z-Wave system.
ABSTRACT