Protective effect of blue-light shield eyewear for adults against light pollution from self-luminous devices used at night

ABSTRACT

We investigated sleep quality and melatonin in 12 adults who wore blue-light shield or control eyewear 2 hours before sleep while using a self-luminous portable device, and assessed visual quality for the two eyewear types. Overnight melatonin secretion was significantly higher after using the blue-light shield (P < 0.05) than with the control eyewear. Sleep efficacy and sleep latency were significantly superior for wearers of the blue-light shield (P < 0.05 for both), and this group reported greater sleepiness during portable device use compared to those using the control eyewear. Participants rated the blue-light shield as providing acceptable visual quality.

KEYWORDS:

• Blue-light
• light pollution
• eyewear
• melatonin
• sleep
• eye fatigue
• retinal ganglion cells

Acknowledgements

We thank Dr Takayuki Abe for help with statistical analyses. We acknowledge Inter-Biotech (http://www.inter-biotech.com) for assistance with the English language editing of this manuscript.