Around the year 2000, there was a great technological innovation in the manufacturing method of progressive addition lenses (PALs). Until then, PALs had been manufactured for decades by first creating in advance many unified semi-finished lenses in which the convex surface had progressive addition power and then, for each prescription generating its concave surface to a specified spherical or toroidal shape in accordance with the prescription. The innovation called free-form technology, makes possible the manufacture of complex surfaces such as a progressive addition surface with high precision and within a short period. For the first time in lens dispensing, it becomes possible for each prescription to design and manufacture a pair of spectacle lenses that optimize the visual performance of the wearer. This article aimed to explain how the free-formed surface is designed and what benefits are to the wearer.

The use of information and communication technology (ICT) has been promoted in school education, and opportunities for children to use tablet computers in the classroom have been increasing. However, there are concerns about the health impacts of ICT use, such as visual acuity loss and visual fatigue, among children. In fact, according to a school health statistics survey, the percentage of elementary school students with <1.0 vision is increasing every year. Herein, we review the current state of ICT use in school education, physical fatigue in children using tablet computers, and guidelines for the safe and secure use of digital devices in schools.

In the fields of medicine and biology, research methods for elucidating biological phenomena, such as mathematical models and simulation, are increasingly attracting attention. However, for many researchers these approaches are difficult to understand, and have thus, not yet been applied significantly in myopia research. Meanwhile, Flitcroft reported that his original refractive development model equation could simulate refraction at any age. I examine and explain the meaning of his research, as well as the importance of mathematical modeling in myopia research.

Progressive multifocal contact lenses (MFCL) based on the concept of off-axis aberration suppression and concentric MFCL designed to induce blurring of myopic retinal images are attracting attention as optical myopia progression suppression methods. Compared to glasses, CL has the advantage of being able to control the retinal image as theoretically because it is not affected by eye movement. The rate of inhibition of myopia progression of MFCL has been reported to be about 30%. A pilot clinical study using progressive MFCL with progressively low addition showed that myopia progression can be suppressed, but the mechanism cannot be explained by the off-axis aberration theory, and the amount of accommodative response is small. It was suggested that the mechanism of accommodative effort reduction might be working. In recent years, contact lenses with an extended depth of field (EDOF) have also been shown to be effective in suppressing myopia progression in clinical research. Therefore, the MFCL designed to reduce accommodative effort has been effective in suppressing myopia.

Many studies from around the world have reported the efficacy of orthokeratology in slowing myopia progression since 2005, which has been supported by a meta-analysis. Orthokeratology (OK) is now recognized as the most reliable treatment to slow myopia progression. Atropine 0.01% ophthalmic solution has recently been attracting attention, since the report of its efficacy in 2012. It is generally considered that atropine can slow the progression of myopia by a pharmaceutical mechanism, and that OK can slow the progression by an optical mechanism. We conducted a prospective clinical study to confirm the effectiveness of the combined treatment and reported that additive effects were achieved.

The prevalence of myopia is increasing globally, and the situation is especially serious in East Asia. The progression of myopia is rapid in childhood and adolescence. Therefore, controlling it during this period is most important. A spectacle lens that is noninvasive and easy to use, called the “defocus incorporated multiple segments (DIMS) lens,” has been introduced as a solution in myopia control. Many defocus segments on the lens provide myopic defocus while the lens is correcting the refractive error of the wearer. A 2-year randomized clinical trial, conducted by a team at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (Hung Hom, Hong Kong), showed that myopia progressed 52% and axial length elongated 62% more slowly for children in the DIMS group than children in the single vision (SV) group.

As optical coherence tomography (OCT) technology has developed, the photographing range and the image quality of fundus OCT images have improved. However, fundus OCT images contain noise such as speckle noise. Application of the averaging method will improve their image qualities. In the averaging technique, noise is reduced by scanning the same area multiple times and then averaging images to obtain a clear image. The more frames the better the image, but this requires more time for photographing, which causes a burden on patients.

We proposed noise reduction from a single scan of OCT using Deep Learning, aiming to obtain images conforming to 120 images used by the averaging method from a single-shot of OCT. The effectiveness of the proposed method is shown through both objective and subjective evaluations.