Biomechanics of the Cornea Evaluated by Spectral Analysis of Waveforms from Ocular Response Analyzer and Corvis-ST

PURPOSE: In this study, spectral analysis of the deformation signal from Corvis-ST (CoST) and reflected light intensity from ocular response analyzer (ORA) was performed to evaluate biomechanical concordance with each other. METHODS: The study was non-interventional, observational, cross-sectional and involved 188 eyes from 94 normal subjects. Three measurements were made on each eye with ORA and CoST each and then averaged for each device. The deformation signal from CoST and reflected light intensity (applanation) signal from ORA was compiled for all the eyes. The ORA signal was inverted about a line joining the two applanation peaks. All the signals were analyzed with Fourier series. The area under the signal curves (AUC), root mean square (RMS) of all the harmonics, lower order (LO included 1(st) and 2(nd) order harmonic), higher order (HO up to 6(th) harmonic), CoST deformation amplitude (DA), corneal hysteresis (CH) and corneal resistance factor (CRF) were analyzed. RESULTS: The device variables and those calculated by Fourier transform were statistically significantly different between CoST and ORA. These variables also differed between the eyes of the same subject. There was also statistically significant influence of eyes (left vs. right) on the differences in a sub-set of RMS variables only. CH and CRF differed statistically significantly between the eyes of subject (p<0.001) but not DA (p = 0.65). CONCLUSIONS: CoST was statistically significantly different from ORA. CoST may be useful in delineating true biomechanical differences between the eyes of a subject as it reports deformation.