Learning cardiopulmonary resuscitation theory with face-to-face versus audiovisual instruction for secondary school students: a randomized controlled trial.

Objectives: To compare secondary students' learning of basic life support (BLS) theory and the use of an automatic external defibrillator (AED) through face-to-face classroom instruction versus educational video instruction.

Material And Methods: A total of 2225 secondary students from 15 schools were randomly assigned to one of the following 5 instructional groups: 1) face-to-face instruction with no audiovisual support, 2) face-to-face instruction with audiovisual support, 3) audiovisual instruction without face-to-face instruction, 4) audiovisual instruction with face-to-face instruction, and 5) a control group that received no instruction. The students took a test of BLS and AED theory before instruction, immediately after instruction, and 2 months later.

Focus correction in an apodized system with spherical aberration.

We performed a theoretical and computational analysis of the through-focus axial irradiance in a system with a Gaussian amplitude pupil function and fourth- and sixth-order spherical aberration (SA). Two cases are analyzed: low aberrated systems, and the human eye containing significant levels of SA and a natural apodization produced by the Stiles-Crawford effect. Results show that apodization only produces a refraction change of the plane that maximized the Strehl ratio for eyes containing significant levels of negative SA.

Limitations of the ocular wavefront correction with contact lenses.

We analyze theoretically, by means of both computer simulations and laboratory experiments, the limitations of correcting aberrations with ideal customized contact lenses. Four experiments are presented: In the first one, we have analyzed the limitations of a static correction on the dynamic wavefront. In the second one, we studied the rotations of a contact lens on the eye using an optical method.

Aberration generation by contact lenses with aspheric and asymmetric surfaces.

Purpose: We explored the potential of aberration correction in the human eye by using a new generation of soft contact lenses with aspheric and asymmetric surfaces.

Methods: Soft contact lens samples were designed with one asymmetrical surface (front) and one spherical (back) to produce predetermined amounts of desired pure defocus, astigmatism, trefoil, coma, and spherical aberration. Contact lens wavefront aberrations were measured ex vivo using a Fizeau-Tolanski interferometer and compared with the in vivo wavefronts obtained by subtracting the aberrations of the eye with and without the contact lenses.

Ocular wave-front aberration statistics in a normal young population.

Monochromatic ocular aberrations in 108 eyes of a normal young population (n=59) were studied. The wave-front aberration were obtained under natural conditions using a near-infrared Shack-Hartmann wave-front sensor. For this population and a 5 mm pupil, more than 99% of the root-mean square wave-front error is contained in the first four orders of a Zernike expansion and about 91% corresponds only to the second order.