Central corneal thickness and its relationship to ocular parameters in young adult myopic eyes.

BACKGROUND

An investigation was carried out to find the distribution of central corneal thickness (CCT) and the association between CCT and ocular factors in a cohort of myopic Chinese adults who underwent laser refractive surgery.

METHODS

Medical records of 1,190 subjects (754 males) aged from 18 to 44 years (21.5 ± 3.5 years for males and 24.9 ± 5.5 years for females) undergoing myopic refractive surgery were filtered and analysed. Each parameter was stratified by gender and eye, respectively. Multi-linear and linear regressions were used to analyse the effect of intraocular pressure (IOP), period of contact lens wearing, gender, age, refractive error, mean corneal curvature (K) and ocular high-order aberration at 5.0-mm zone on CCT.

RESULTS

The mean CCT was 539.2 ± 37.8 µm in the whole study population. Males had greater CCT than females (p < 0.001), while females had greater K than males (p < 0.001). There was no difference in IOP, ocular cylinder or higher-order aberrations between genders. No interocular difference was identified either in IOP or K. Multi-linear regression model revealed that only gender, IOP and K were correlated with CCT (standardised coefficients of right eye are -0.101, p = 0.001 for gender, 0.231, p < 0.001 for IOP and -0.080, p = 0.009 for K; standardised coefficients of left eye are -0.090, p = 0.002 for gender, 0.310, p < 0.001 for IOP and -0.076, p = 0.015 for K).

CONCLUSIONS

In a population of myopic candidates for laser refractive surgery, only gender, IOP and K were correlated with CCT.