The most likely effective treatment to slow myopia progression thus far is anti-muscarinic topical medication. However, side effects of these medications include light sensitivity and near blur. Also, they are not yet commercially available, so their use is limited and not practical. Further information is required for other methods of myopia control, such as the use of corneal reshaping contact lenses or bifocal soft contact lenses (BSCLs) with a distance center are promising, but currently no published randomized clinical trials exist.
Houston Myopia Control Study: a randomized clinical trial. Part II. Final report by the patient care team.
In a randomized clinical trial designed to test the efficacy of bifocal lenses for the control of juvenile myopia, each of 207 children between the ages of 6 and 15 years wore single vision lenses, +1.00 D add bifocals, or +2.00 D add bifocals for a period of 3 years. For the 124 subjects who completed the study, the mean changes in refraction were found to be -0.34 D per year for subjects wearing single vision lenses, -0.36 D per year for those wearing +1.00 D add bifocals, and -0.34 D per year for those wearing +2.00 D add bifocals. These differences were not statistically significant. When subjects in all three treatment groups were combined, it was found that the rate of progression tended to be the most rapid for subjects who entered the study at an early age with a large amount of myopia, and tended to be the least rapid for subjects who entered the study at a later age with a small amount of myopia. It was also found that subjects having with-the-rule astigmatism progressed more slowly than those having no astigmatism or against-the-rule astigmatism.