Real-world effectiveness of myopia control spectacles and dual-focus contact lenses in the French myopia cohort

Our study aimed to compare the efficacy of Myopia Control Spectacles (MCS), including Defocus Incorporated Multiple Segment (DIMS) and Highly Aspherical Lenslets (HAL), and dual-focus contact lenses on myopia progression. This longitudinal, real-world study included myopic children aged 7 to 18 years wearing myopia control optical modalities for at least 12 months between 2020 and 2024, with a group using single-vision lenses included for reference. After matching for age, sex, and baseline refractive error, changes in cycloplegic spherical equivalent of the right eye were assessed at twelve, eighteen, and twenty-four months, including a subgroup of children who showed faster initial progression. The cohort included 425 children using dual-focus contact lenses, 307 using DIMS, 118 using HAL, and 850 using single-vision lenses. At twenty-four months, myopia control was not statistically different between the dual-focus contact lenses and myopia control spectacles group. For the subgroup of progressors, the myopia control groups of children showed median progression of − 0.25 to 0.00D. In this European real-world study on different myopia control optical modalities, both MCS and MCL showed no statistical differences in reduction in myopia progression (for 7 to 12 years old, \(\:{\epsilon\:}^{2}\) =0.01 [95%CI = 0 to 0.07]. These findings should be interpreted with caution, as the study relied on spherical equivalent calculated from optical refraction rather than axial length measurement, thereby restricting its ability to fully assess true myopia progression.