Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2022 Aug;70(8):3112-3115.
doi: 10.4103/ijo.IJO_221_22.

The Gimbalscope - A novel smartphone-assisted retinoscopy technique

Prithvi Chandrakanth  1 , Hirika Gosalia  2 , Shishir Verghese  1 , Kalpana Narendran  2 , Venkatapathy Narendran  1
Affiliations

The Gimbalscope - A novel smartphone-assisted retinoscopy technique

Prithvi Chandrakanth et al. Indian J Ophthalmol. 2022 Aug.

Abstract

The authors describe a novel technique of performing retinoscopy assisted with a smartphone (gimbalscope). We found this technique of digital retinoscopy to be useful for demonstrating and documenting retinoscopic reflexes and in addition as an easy teaching tool. This technical report explains the assembly of our smartphone-assisted retinoscope and provides examples of the range of normal and abnormal reflexes that can be captured.

Keywords: Innovation; retinoscopy; smartphone; streak retinoscope.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

None

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
(a) Materials required to prepare the gimbalscope: (i) smartphone, (ii) metal smartphone mount holder bracket clamp, (iii) retinoscope, (iv) smartphone holder clamps, (v) superglue, and (vi) rubberbands; (b) Diagrammatic representation of smartphone-assisted retinoscopy
Figure 2
Figure 2
(a) Smartphone holder clamps attached together using super glue and rubber bands; (b) A smartphone is attached to one of the holder clamps; (c) A metal smartphone mount holder (with the clamp removed) is passed through the battery hand piece of the retinoscope; (d) The clamp with the smartphone attached to it is connected onto the smartphone mount holder which is secured to the retinoscope battery hand piece using the available screw; (e) The smartphone camera is then aligned to the eyepiece of the retinoscope, and the whole setup is reinforced (gimbalscope); (f) Front view of the gimbalscope; (g) retinoscope light streak clearly captured on the smartphone camera; (h) Gimbalscope in use by an optometrist at a distance of 1.5 meters with the neutralization reflex clearly captured on the smartphone camera
Figure 3
Figure 3
Smartphone-assisted retinoscopy on patient eyes with diagrammatic representations (inset images): (a) Retinoscopic reflex at the point of neutralization; (b and c) “With motion” retinoscopic reflex; (d) Retinoscopic reflex revealing media opacity because of cataract; (e and f) “Against the motion” retinoscopic reflex
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Fukuhara J, Miller KM, Vega C, Guyton DL. A teaching attachment for retinoscopy. Ophthalmology. 1987;94:28–30. - PubMed
    1. Wessels GF, Oeinck C, Guzek JP, Wessels IF. A home-made model eye for teaching retinoscopy. Ophthalmic Surg Lasers. 1995;26:489–91. - PubMed
    1. Miller KM, Simons K, Guyton DL. Television retinoscopy with a slit-aperture retinoscope and a highly sensitive camera. Ophthalmology. 1987;94:22–7. - PubMed
    1. Donovan L, Brian G, du Toit R. A device to aid the teaching of retinoscopy in low-resource countries. Br J Ophthalmol. 2008;92:294–4. - PubMed
    1. Pujari A, Saluja G, Agarwal D, Selvan H, Sharma N. Clinically useful smartphone ophthalmic imaging techniques. Graefes Arch Clin Exp Ophthalmol. 2021;259:279–87. - PubMed