Study on the corneal higher-order aberrations and correlation in patients with different degrees of myopia suitable for wavefront-guided FS-LASIK

Abstract Background: To investigate the characteristics and distribution of anterior and posterior surface wavefront aberrations in patients suitable for corneal refractive surgery. Methods: A total of 121 myopic patients (121 eyes, 14-46 years old) who underwent corneal refractive surgery were randomly selected by the Pentacam anterior segment analysis system with a spherical equivalent (SE) of -1.50 to -12.00 D. The corneal anterior and posterior aberrations (higher-order aberration, HOA; spherical aberration, SA; Coma; Trefoil) and Q and K values were detected, and a correlation analysis of the relevant parameters was carried out. Results: The root-mean-square (RMS) of the third to sixth order aberrations of the ocular and corneal wave surface aberrations at a 6.0-mm pupil showed a decreasing trend in patients suitable for the corneal refractive surgery, and the RMS of the third order aberrations accounted for 62.92% of the total HOAs. The coma ratio (coma ratio: coma/total cornea higher-order aberrations) was increased with the increasing diopters, while the spherical aberration ratio (spherical aberration/ total cornea higher-order aberrations) was not changed. In addition, the spherical aberration was 0.203± 0.082 μm (range: 0.061 to 0.503 μm), and the Q30 was -0.19±0.03 (range: -0.58 to 0.31). There were significant differences in the coma aberrations of preoperative corneal anterior surface (3, 1) between the low, middle and high myopia groups (P=0.013). The spherical equivalent was positively correlated with the corneal coma of the preoperative anterior corneal surfaces (R=-0.241, P=0.009), and the Q value was positively correlated with the total higher-order aberrations (R=0.326, P<0.001). Conclusions: Individual wavefront aberrations on the anterior and posterior surfaces of the cornea are comparatively different, and the Zernike coefficients are related to the degree of myopia. Spherical aberrations are the most overriding aberrations of the cornea.