Charlotte Timbury, Essilor® Stellest™ lenses product and category manager at Essilor, explains how the company’s Stellest™ lens can help to prevent a future impaired by high myopia
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Having gained more than 30 years of research and development experience in myopia, Essilor is very aware that the condition is a global problem.
With predictions that half of the world’s population will have myopia by 2050,14 and that a fifth of those will be considered to have high myopia, the company is committed to developing innovative and effective solutions to help slow down myopia progression in children. Here, Essilor® Stellest™ lenses product and category manager, Charlotte Timbury, explains how the Essilor® Stellest™ lens works as part of our armour in preventing high myopia and its related ocular pathology in the future.
A prospective, double-masked clinical trial at the Wenzhou Medical University in China showed that, after two years, Essilor® Stellest™ lenses slow down myopia progression on average by 67% (0.99D) and axial elongation by 60% (0.41mm) compared to single vision lenses, when worn 12 or more hours per day, every day.7 This two-year clinical trial enrolled children aged eight to 13 and showed that Essilor® Stellest™ lenses are efficient in slowing down myopia progression for younger or older children, regardless of gender and those with lower or higher degrees of myopia.7 The trial also demonstrated that wearing time considerably influenced the treatment outcome, with longer wearing hours resulting in better myopia control efficacy. These clinical trial results were recently published in JAMA Ophthalmology.7 In addition to the ongoing clinical trial, new results from a randomised, double-masked, year-on-year cross-over clinical trial were presented at the ARVO 2022 annual meeting. The trial evaluated the progression of myopia in 119 Vietnamese children wearing Essilor® Stellest™ lenses and Single Vision Lenses. The randomised, double-masked, cross-over clinical trial demonstrates that Essilor® Stellest™ lenses slow myopia in children who already have the condition. Importantly, when children switched from Essilor Stellest lenses to single vision spectacle lenses, progression was similar to that observed with use of single vision spectacles and indicates no rebound of myopia. Compliance was high, with no differences compared to single vision lenses.11
The lens consists of a single vision zone and a myopia control zone, made with H.A.L.T1 technology. The single vision zone ensures the correction of refractive error in all gaze directions, while the H.A.L.T technology creates a volume of non-focused light in front of the retina, a signal slowing down the eye elongation. It has been shown in the literature that when the retina perceives two signals at the same time, one in front of the retina and the other behind it, the former prevails and protects the eye from elongation.2 Studies suggest that the power creating a volume of signal has a stronger efficacy than a surface of signal.4,5
The lens delivers a first signal on the retina, the correction, through a single vision zone that carries the far prescription. This signal ensures sharp far vision, so that the child can carry out their everyday activities. This is where the H.A.L.T1 technology comes into play. The technology consists of a constellation of 1021 contiguous lenslets, spread on 11 rings. The light that passes through the lenslets creates a volume of non-focused light in front of the retina, which follows the shape of a child’s theoretical myopic retina. This second signal plays the role of a myopia slow down signal.
The aspherical lenslets are contiguous, and each ring is computed according to several geometrical and optical parameters. As mentioned, the light that passes through the H.A.L.T1 technology creates a volume of non-focused light in front of the retina and following its shape. This non-focused light is enough to efficiently play the role of a myopia slow down signal.
Ideally the child should wear Essilor® Stellest™ lenses during their whole waking day. The wearer trial results that show the lenses slow down myopia progression by 67% on average7 are based on children wearing them for a minimum of 12 hours per day, every day.
Frame fitting is important to ensure an optimal vision experience, and this is also the case with Essilor Stellest lenses. Pantoscopic angle and vertex distance should be monitored so that it is suitable for the child’s frame and to make sure minimal slippage of frame occurs, ensuring the child is looking through the central vision zone.
Can you tell us about the guarantee?
Essilor® Stellest™ lenses in the UK and Ireland are covered by a prescription guarantee and a loss/breakage guarantee. If the patient’s prescription changes by -0.50D or more within 12 months, a new pair Essilor® Stellest™ lenses will be provided free of charge. If the optician makes a claim under the loss and breakage part of the guarantee, a new pair (with the same Rx) will be supplied at a low fixed cost of £20 / €20 for the pair.
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