Rapid and Precise In Vivo Measurement of Human Corneal Thickness with Optical Low-Coherence Reflectometry in Normal Human Eyes

An optical low-coherence reflectometer is used for rapid noncontact measurements of the human corneal thickness in vivo. Thickness measurements on ten volunteers show a standard deviation of 3.4 μm. The experiments reveal that the optical reflectometer benefits from a 2.5 fold enhancement of the measurement precision and a 2.8 fold reduction in measurement time compared to a standard clinical ultrasonic pachometer.