Measuring retinal stray light

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T he extent of stray light incident on the retina can be a significant factor for determining patient vision and is a parameter largely independent of visual acuity. Problems associated with pre-existing pathologies such as macular degeneration or glaucoma can also be rendered more serious due to the presence of such retinal stray light. It is only recently, however, with the development of systems for measurement of this parameter in the clinical setting such as the C-Quant device (marketed by Oculus) that its significance is being more widely evaluated. The C-Quant, short for cataract-quantifier, device was developed by Dr Tom van den Berg, from the Netherlands Ophthalmic Research Institute (NORI) in Amsterdam. Within many optical instrumentation systems, however, levels of stray light have long been identified as a parameter influencing the quality of derived spectral or image information.