Special Feature
A University of Waterloo PhD
graduate has developed the world’s
first standardized Arabic reading
acuity chart.
Dr. Balsam Alabdulkader, who
received her PhD in 2017 from the
School of Optometry and Vision
Science, says she was inspired to
create the chart after returning to
her clinical job in Riyadh, Saudi
Arabia, and becoming frustrated
with what was available.
“I wanted to get a standardized
chart in Arabic for testing my
patients. I then discovered that we
don’t have one,” she says.
“
The chart will affect the world of
optometry by allowing for more
effective eye care for Arabic-
speaking populations globally,
she says.
“I used to work at the low-vision
clinic here in Saudi, before
travelling to Canada to pursue my
master’s degree. At that time,
I never paid attention to the charts
that we used at the clinic and how
unstandardized they were,”
Dr. Alabdulkader says.
“Other charts that I used to have
in the clinic, had famous poems,
sayings or Quran verses which
Other charts that I used to have in the
clinic, had famous poems, sayings or Quran
verses which made some patients read from their
memory. These were useless because they were
not testing vision, but instead memory.
It was designed based on the
accepted design criteria for reading
acuity charts. It will eliminate the
potential for inconsistent eye results,
as it addresses challenges presented
by the language’s complexity.
Dr. Alabdulkader says her
experience as a clinician in her
home country of Saudi Arabia and
education in Canada sparked the
initial idea for the BAL chart.
“
The new chart, developed by Dr.
Alabdulkader with the help of Dr.
Susan Leat, who supervised the
project, is known as the Balsam
Alabdulkader-Leat (BAL) chart.
made some patients read from
their memory,” she says. “These
were useless because they were not
testing vision, but instead memory.”
For her master’s thesis research,
Dr. Alabdulkader worked on the
MNREAD chart, which is a gold
standardized chart in English.
“I learned about the different
standardized features of this
chart, how it was developed, the
importance of using standardized
charts in testing patients and why
using an unstandardized chart
may affect testing results.”
Developing the BAL chart was
no easy feat. It took around five
and a half years and was full of
challenges.
“The Arabic letters are complex,”
says Dr. Alabdulkader, who
currently works as an assistant
professor at the School of Optometry
at King Saud University in Riyadh.
“Unlike Roman letters where
most of the letters can be fitted
between two lines defined as the
x-height, each Arabic character
has different shapes depending
on its position within the word.
This made measuring the size very
challenging.”
The BAL chart is now commercially
available through Precision
Vision and can be purchased from
anywhere around the globe.
“I did not think the chart would
ever be manufactured. With all
the challenges I faced during my
studies, I thought the project would
end with insignificant results and
be printed as a thesis project,” says
Dr. Alabdulkader.
However, she is beyond ecstatic her
dream came true.
“It is unbelievable. I am proud of
myself for working through all
those hard times over in Canada.
I was so far from my family and I
faced so much stress and pressure.
It is surreal that my chart is now
a reality and that it is being used
to make a difference in people’s
lives.”OP
Optical Prism | September 2019 35