Voluntary alteration of full-field electroretinogram

Purpoe To evaluate whether a normal ubject can deliberately produce abnormal electroretinogram (ERG) reult that imulate diorder of the retina. Deign Propective tudy. Method Five normal ubject were evaluated twice with full-field ERG. The ubject were randomly aigned to be compliant or noncompliant (i.e., to deliberately attempt to alter the tet reult) at each viit. Reult from compliant eye were compared with thoe of noncompliant eye. Reult While the amplitude of all parameter were decreaed in the noncompliant group, the difference wa not tatitically ignificant, and the reult were uually within the normal limit of our laboratory. No ubject wa able to alter the reult to mimic a retinal dieae or to reproduce a pecific pattern of change. Concluion Although ERG reult can be altered by noncompliant ubject, the reult are uually only “borderline abnormal” and do not correpond to any pattern of retinal dieae. Thee reult confirm that abnormal full-field ERG indicate true retinal dieae.