Many myopes exhibit difficulties with near visual tasks when contact lenses are substituted for spectacles. Girard1 attributes these commonly observed near-point difficulties to an increased accommodation requirement in the myope when he is switched to contact lenses, and presents theoretical data confirming significant differences between contact lenses and equivalent spectacle lenses when close objects are viewed. He summarizes his findings by stating, "It is possible to precipitate the state of presbyopia by placing a middle-aged myope in contact lenses. Conversely, it is theoretically possible to forestall the state of presbyopia in a hyperope by successfully placing him in contact lenses."
Despite this common clinical impression of near-work difficulty in the myope switched to contact lenses, no carefully performed study of the accommodation requirement has been performed in this group, although recently we have presented an objective study showing an increased convergence requirement when contact lenses are substituted for glasses,