Purpose: To describe baseline refractive and ocular component measures in children with myopia enrolled in the Correction of Myopia Evaluation Trial (COMET). COMET is a multicenter, randomized clinical trial to evaluate whether progressive-addition lenses slow the progression of juvenile-onset myopia compared with single-vision lenses.
Methods: Four hundred sixty-nine children with myopia between -1.25 and -4.50 D spherical equivalent and without eye or systemic conditions known to affect refractive development were recruited from four geographically and ethnically diverse communities in the United States. Their ages were 6 to 11 years inclusive, and 52% were girls. The main outcome measure for the overall trial is progression of myopia determined by cycloplegic autorefraction after inducement of cycloplegia with 2 drops of 1% tropicamide. Axial length, the secondary outcome measure, was assessed by ultrasonography. The distance correction was determined by subjective methods before cycloplegia, with noncycloplegic autorefraction values as the starting point.
Results: Because data were similar in both eyes, they are reported for the right eye only. The mean spherical equivalent measured by cycloplegic autorefraction was -2.38 +/- 0.81 D. Young children had significantly less myopia than older children (P = 0.03), but the amount of myopia did not differ by gender or ethnicity. Mean axial dimensions were 4.0 +/- 0.2 mm (anterior chamber), 3.4 +/- 0.2 mm (lens), 16.8 +/- 0.7 mm (vitreous chamber), and 24.1 +/- 0.7 mm (axial length). Girls' eyes had significantly shorter axial length than boys' (P < 0.0001). Mean corneal radii were 7.73 +/- 0.25 mm (horizontal) and 7.59 +/- 0.24 mm (vertical). Ninety-five percent of the eyes had a ratio of axial length to corneal radius higher than 3.0.
Conclusions: These baseline measures provide cross-sectional data on a large group of ethnically diverse children with myopia. Refractive and axial component dimensions are consistent with data in other studies showing that myopic eyes have longer vitreous chambers than emmetropic eyes. The measures reported herein will serve as a basis for examining changes that occur over a minimum of 3 years of follow-up of children enrolled in COMET.