Method and apparatus for correcting vision using an electro-active phoropter

Abstract

An electro-active phoropter and a method of using the electro-active phoropter to measure a patient's vision prescription is disclosed. The electro-active phoropter includes a series of individually addressable electro-active lenses. The lenses have either a positive or negative optical power when an electrical potential is applied across the lens and a neutral optical power when no electrical potential is applied across the lens. Each lens provides an optical power that is part of a net optical power of the series of lenses when a patient views through the phoropter. The optical power of the phoropter can be incrementally adjusted by changing the distribution of the electrical potential across the different lenses of the series to provide increasing or decreasing optical power until a patient achieves a desired level of clarity and a vision prescription has been determined.

1 . A system for determining a vision prescription, comprising: 
 a phoropter having at least one electro-active lens; and    an auto-refractor operatively coupled to the phoropter, wherein the auto-refractor is adapted for providing the phoropter with an approximate prescription for a patient's eye, and wherein the phoropter is adapted for setting the optical power of the at least one electro-active lens with the approximate prescription.    
   
   
       2 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein the approximate prescription corrects for a lower order aberration in the patient's eye.  
   
   
       3 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein the auto-refractor comprises a wave front analyzer for providing the phoropter with wave front data.  
   
   
       4 . The system of  claim 3 , wherein the approximate prescription corrects for a higher order aberration in the patient's eye.  
   
   
       5 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein the optical power of the at least one electro-active lens is adjusted based on user input.  
   
   
       6 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein the phoropter sets the optical power of the at least one electro-active lens at substantially the same time as the auto-refractor provides the phoropter with the approximate prescription.  
   
   
       7 . The system of  claim 1 , wherein the at least one electro-active lens is a diffractive lens.