Comparison of open-field autorefraction, closed-field autorefraction, and retinoscopy for refractive measurements of children and adolescents in Taiwan

Purpose: To evaluate the accuracy and effectiveness of noncycloplegic and cycloplegic autorefraction using two types of autorefractors (ARs) compared with retinoscopy in children and adolescents. Methods: This cross-sectional study included 308 students (6–17 years old) from eastern Taiwan. Noncycloplegic and cycloplegic refractive measurements were obtained using open-field AR (Shin-Nippon NVision-K 5001), closed-field AR (Topcon KR-800), and cycloplegic retinoscopy. Three optical components emerged from the measurements: spherical equivalent (M) and two Jackson cross-cylinder values (J0 and J45). Agreement between both ARs and retinoscopy was evaluated using intraclass correlation coefficient. Measurement discrepancies from retinoscopy among different ARs and cycloplegic status were compared using repeated measures ANOVA and receiver operating characteristic curve analysis. Results: Compared with retinoscopy, measurements obtained before and after cycloplegia with both ARs showed excellent reliability for evaluating M and J0 and fair to good results for J45. More myopic results were obtained using KR-800 before cycloplegia; more hyperopic results were obtained using KR-800 and NVision-K 5001 after cycloplegia(all p