Do Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus and Color-Vision Deficiencies Influence Shade-Matching Ability?

Purpose: To evaluate the effect of color-vision deficiencies and type 1 diabetes mellitus (DM) on visual shade-matching ability.

Materials And Methods: Four groups of participants were investigated: a control group (n = 68); a group with protanomalia (n = 10); a group with deuteranomalia (n = 19); and a group with type 1 DM (n = 13). Color vision was evaluated monocularly using the Ishihara test, Farnsworth-Munsell 100 hue (FM100H) test, Hardy Rand Rittler (HRR) test, and with an HMC Anomaloskop MR (Rayleigh and Moreland tests). The final exam was on a Toothguide Training Box (TTB) and consisted of 15 lightness-chroma-hue tasks. The color difference (ΔE*) and the shade-matching score (ΣΔE*) were computed, and the correct lightness (L*), chroma (C*), and hue (h*) selections were counted. The means and standard deviations for the ΣΔE*, ΔE*, L*, C*, h*, Ishihara, HRR, FM100H, and Rayleigh and Moreland tests were calculated. One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and post hoc Bonferroni test were used for statistical analyses and a comparison of means (α = .05). The data analyses were performed using SPSS 22.0 for Windows (IBM).

Results: The control group selected the shade tab on the TTB significantly better (ΣΔE* = 31.57 ± 13.50) than the group with protanomalia (ΣΔE* = 55.50 ± 12.36; P < .0001) and the group with deuteranomalia (ΣΔE* = 59.18 ± 16.35; P < .0001), but not significantly better than the group with type 1 DM (ΣΔE* = 39.43 ± 11.46; P = .368). The group with type 1 DM selected the shade tab on the TTB significantly better than the group with protanomalia (P = .038) and the group with deuteranomalia (P < .0001).

Conclusion: Participants with color-vision deficiencies are less accurate at shade matching than the control group and the group with type 1 DM.