Validation of the Holmes‐wright Lanterns for Testing Colour Vision*

Abstract

The recently introduced Holmes - Wright Type A and Type B lanterns and the Farnsworth lantern were administered to 100 observers with normal colour vision and 100 observers with defective colour vision. With the fail criteria adopted, all normals passed the Holmes - Wright Type A lantern and with one exception all normals passed the Farnsworth lantern. However, 8% of normals failed the more difficult Holmes - Wright Type B lantern. It is noted that the normals who fail this lantern test appear to do so not because of poor colour discrimination but because the coloured stimuli presented by the lantern have a point brilliance close to the average chromatic threshold. About one-third of the colour vision defective group passed the Farnsworth lantern and between 14 and 17% passed the Holmes - Wright Type A lantern depending on the test procedure used. Only two mild deuteranomals in the sample of 100 colour abnormal observers succeeded in passing the Holmes - Wright Type B lantern. Dichromats and severe anomalous trichromats fail all three lanterns so that those who pass are all mild anomalous trichromats. A significant proportion of protanomals pass the Farnsworth lantern and some protanomals pass the Holmes - Wright Type A lantern despite their reduced sensitivity to red light and correspondingly reduced signal range for red signals.

Subjects with colour vision deficiency in the community: what do primary care physicians need to know?

“…The Holmes-Wright Type B lantern is the standard colour vision test used by the Board of Trade in maritime industry [28]. A 1983 study that validated the Holmes-Wright Type B lantern test as a discriminating test showed that all CVD persons failed, except for a few mild deuteranomals [28]. This correlates with other studies which also showed that all CVD persons, except for a few mild deuteranomals, make errors recognising maritime signals [29,30].…”

“…The Holmes-Wright Type B lantern is the standard colour vision test used by the Board of Trade in maritime industry [28]. A 1983 study that validated the Holmes-Wright Type B lantern test as a discriminating test showed that all CVD persons failed, except for a few mild deuteranomals [28].…”

Who fails lantern tests?

“…Council, 1933). In other cases the fail criterion is not openly stated (Vingrys and Cole, 1983) or the real criterion may be obscured by a process of review and appeal (Topley, 1959;Cole and Vingrys, 1982). The practitioner's task is made even more difficult by the fact that descriptions of the lanterns, the recommended test procedures and fail criteria are not published in places easily accessible to most ophthalmic practitioners, and text book accounts of lantern tests are cursory.…”

“…The Farnsworth lantern has been well validated by Paulson (1966) and Laxar (1967)and recently we (Vingrys and Cole, 1983) reported on the more recently introduced Holmes-Wright lantern tests. Cameron (1967) has reported on the Martin lantern.…”

Sentido cromático: tipos de defeitos e testes de avaliação clínica

“…Outro teste semelhante é o de Holmes-Wright Lantern (H-W), cuja sensibilidade para detecção de defeitos congêni-tos é de cerca de 80%, se o critério utilizado for de até 2 erros durante a aplicação de mesmo (60)(61) . Recentemente, também se tornou indisponível.…”