Oculus users?

[SpecialT]

I am thinking about purchasing and Oculus unit for a satellite office. I haven't used one and am scheduled to demo the unit. Anyone using it? Any major drawbacks? The alternative is an FDT which I am only familiar with in terms of screening use.

[QDO1]

do you mean an oculus field screening unit?

[SpecialT]

do you mean an oculus field screening unit?

Technically it is called the Oculus Easyfield.

[QDO1]

Technically it is called the Oculus Easyfield.

the early oculus units were very tempermental (the cables inside kept getting loose and dis-connecting. this was solved in the later units. a nice quick and user-friendly unit

[snowmonster]

I've had the EasyField for about a year now. I had been used to the standard newer Humphrey models in other offices that I had worked at, but could not resist the price difference, size and what some references had said about it.

With the machine set up how I want it (which is a fast threshold test), I can get a 24-2 in about 4 to 5 minutes per eye. It also does 30-2 but takes longer, meaning less reliability for the outer points in my mind. Also does a macula 10-2 test which I've run once. The printout comes via a thermal credit card paper roll but I'm told you can connect it to a computer for your standard Humphrey type of display, just haven't done that yet.

The fixation target is a little different. You look at the center of a "diamond" of 4 red lights. The machine tests a spot in the center of the diamond first and generates a threshold and then starts testing peripherally. You can set it up to do short-term fluctuation if you want, of course adding to the length of the test. We get a lot of "false positives" because of the HK fixation method. It assumes that everyone's nerve is in the same spot and I don't think it really plots it out like the Humphreys do. That is my only gripe of the machine. I've given the test myself tons of times and the patients are looking straight ahead. They'll frequently record zero false negatives (except for the occasional "oops" from the patient) but sometimes will record 9/9 false positives when it lights up the spot that should correspond with the physiologic blind spot. But I know it's okay because you can watch the eye on the screen and tell that the patient is maintaining fixation the whole time.

One other thing I really like is this - when you turn it on, it's ready to go within about 1 second. The Humphrey takes about 5 minutes or more to boot/warm up. I guess one thing that is kind of different is that there's no chin rest. The patients leans their forehead against a bar at the top of the machine and then you just need to line them up using the screen and hope they don't move around. That hasn't been a problem for us, but I'm sure you can pause the test and re-align the patient as needed if they drift one direction or another.

After our office moves in 1 week, we hope to run the screening program on everyone over a certain age. Takes just 1 minute or so for each eye with a normal result.

As for reliability of the unit, haven't had a single problem. So if you can get over the fact that there's no true blind spot mapping and want a less expensive machine (almost half as much as a Humphrey Matrix FDT), this is a great option, especially for a smaller satellite office. It looks cool at least, and patients have actually commented on that. "This is much nicer than that old huge machine elsewhere." Anything to keep them alert for a threshold test is fine with me...

-Steve

[SpecialT]

snowmonster - Your response was exactly what I was looking for. Thank you very much for the real life perspective.