A member of the staff at The Eye Center, a Pembroke Pines, Fla., optometry practice, was complaining of debilitating migraines when Sydney Madrigal, OD, MPH, an associate optometrist at the practice, asked whether she could help. After exhausting her practice toolbox, Dr. Madrigal suggested the staff-member-turned-patient get an MRI.
Contact lens kismet?
A day or two later, she says she attended the 2024 Global Specialty Lens Symposium (GSLS),* where Katherine K. Weise, OD, MBA, FAAO, director of Pediatric Optometry Service at the University of Alabama Birmingham, gave a presentation on Altius Performance-Tinted Contact Lenses (https://altiusvision.com), from Performance Vision Technologies.
Specifically, the FDA-cleared lenses are shown to decrease light sensitivity during migraine and, thus, improve a patient’s ability to perform the daily functions of life, such as using digital screens. This is because they filter 100% of ultraviolet rays, over 99% of blue light, and reduce chromatic aberrations (visual noise) by 53%, says the company. The lenses come in plano and from -0.50 D to -6.00 D (in 0.25D steps).
Providing relief
Dr. Madrigal says once she returned from the GSLS, she fit this staff member in plano Altius Grey-Green lenses, and the patient had these two experiences: (1) 20/20 vision from 20/40 vision in her current glasses’ prescription, and (2) feeling better. (At the time of publication, the MRI results are pending.)
Paola Diaz, OD, who practices at Lone Star Vision, with two locations in Texas, and who has been prescribing the lenses for roughly six months, says her migraine-suffering patients who are fit into the Altius Performance-Tinted Contact Lenses either report less migraines or a reduction in the intensity of their migraines.
Heather Webster, OD, of Weber Neuro-Ocular Institute, in Chesterfield, MO, reports a 90% success rate of the lenses diminishing migraine symptoms in both her concussion and migraine-reporting patients. She says those patients who do not derive relief from the Altius Performance-Tinted Contact Lenses are unable to tolerate contact lens wear in general or don’t care for the tint appearance.
Determining candidates
The three optometrists say they approach patients who complain of light sensitivity from recent-
ly diagnosed migraines by re-viewing the patient’s current prescription, if they have one, performing a complete dilated eye exam in the context of their history, a binocular vision exam, and a cover test. Should these items appear normal, they say they discuss the benefits of the Altius Performance-Tinted Contact Lenses. Should a pa-tient present complaining of migraines but report no official diagnosis, the three ODs say they refer them to their primary care physician or the emergency room, depending on symptom severity, though may prescribe Altius to try to decrease symp-toms in the meantime.
Dr. Webster says after prescribing the lenses, she follows up with the patient a week or two later to inquire about migraine relief.
“A majority of my patients report both a decrease in the number of migraine days and severity of migraine. For some, it is one or the other,” she explains. “If everything is going well, we move forward with a supply of lenses.”
* GSLS is run by Conexiant, the publisher of Optometric Management.
