Effect of Illumination on Colour Vision Testing with Farnsworth-Munsell 100 Hue Test: Customized Colour Vision Booth versus Room Illumination

PURPOSE: To evaluate a customized, portable Farnsworth-Munsell 100 (FM 100) hue viewing booth for compliance with colour vision testing standards and to compare it with room illumination in subjects with normal colour vision (trichromats), subjects with acquired colour vision defects (secondary to diabetes mellitus), and subjects with congenital colour vision defects (dichromats). METHODS: Discrete wavelengths of the tube in the customized booth were measured using a spectrometer using the normal incident method and were compared with the spectral distribution of sunlight. Forty-eight subjects were recruited for the study and were divided into 3 groups: Group 1, Normal Trichromats (30 eyes); Group 2, Congenital Colour Vision Defects (16 eyes); and Group 3, Diabetes Mellitus (20 eyes). The FM 100 hue test performance was compared using two illumination conditions, booth illumination and room illumination. RESULTS: Total error scores of the classical method in Group 2 as mean+/-SD for room and booth illumination was 243.05+/-85.96 and 149.85+/-54.50 respectively (p=0.0001). Group 2 demonstrated lesser correlation (r=0.50, 0.55), lesser reliability (Cronbach's alpha, 0.625, 0.662) and greater variability (Bland & Altman value, 10.5) in total error scores for the classical method and the moment of inertia method between the two illumination conditions when compared to the other two groups. CONCLUSIONS: The customized booth demonstrated illumination meeting CIE standards. The total error scores were overestimated by the classical and moment of inertia methods in all groups for room illumination compared with booth illumination, however overestimation was more significant in the diabetes group.

Evaluation of congenital colour vision deficiencies

Three hundred patients who have congenital colour vision deficiencies were examined at the author's eye clinic for 3 years (1987-1990) using 5 types of colour vision tests: Hahn's, TMC's, Okuma's (new), H-R-R's colour vision tests and Double 15 Hue Test (Hahn). The results obtained from each test were quite different in type and grade, and the summarized results were considered to be the best: Type: protan 23.3%, deutan 76.0%, unclassified 0.7% Grade: mild 20.3%, medium 25.3%, strong 54.4% The frequency of coincidence both in type and grade between the summarized results and those of each test were compared, and the highest was 62.3% in Double 15 Hue Test. The efficiency of the author's colour vision test and Double 15 Hue Test were evaluated with the data in this clinical trial, and they were found to be useful for classifying the type and estimating the grade of the congenital and also acquired colour vision deficiencies.