From the article: It projects an image from the lens of the unit onto the wearer's retina to correct the refractive error that causes nearsightedness. Wearing the device 60 to 90 minutes a day corrects myopia according to the Japanese company.
No details in the article but I assume the "smart" part of the name implies it can adjust the image to adapt to different people. It's possible it has some kind of algorithm to slowly adjust the prescription over the 60 to 90 days so that your body begins to adjust by making eye muscles stronger. The visual equivalent of braces for your teeth. No real details, just speculation.
(Speculation) Most non-surgical treatments I've looked into to help with nearsightedness are focused on strengthening the muscles that shape the eye's lens. I wonder if this is designed to train those muscles.
It's probably based on the theory that over a longer time frame the eye adapts to slightly defocused images in order to bring them in focus. The key is that the image must be defocused only slightly, not grossly.
It's amazing what the eye can adapt to. The story of the man who wore the glasses that turned everything upside down... and his brain just adapted to it and he saw things normally... is fascinating to me.
And then there's my eyes. I have severe double vision (as a result of surgery last year) and my brain is just like "meh, suck it up"; and I'm left walking into things on regular basis because there's two of everything. How come _his_ brain figured out upside down, and mine can't figure out 2 of everything? (I'm not actually asking, just complaining a bit /sigh)
Yeah, adaptation is incredible when it works but is also hit-and-miss. I don't like the trend of hyperventilating about "your body is amazing and can adapt to anything" because it comes with an unspoken rider of "so if you have problems it's probably just a character flaw".
However, in both of those studies, participants wore their under-corrective glasses continually, regardless of whether they were doing near-work or just walking / looking at a distance. This is a crucial error, as pointed out by at least Hung and Ciuffreda: <https://www.oepf.org/sites/default/files/journals/jbo-volume...>. It makes intuitive sense to me that under-corrective or anti-corrective glasses should only be worn for a limited amount of time each time and only when doing near-work, in order to induce temporary pressure that the (feedback systems of the) eye can then attempt to correct.
Also see this 2009 review by Barrett regarding the more general practice of behavioral vision therapy: <https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-1313.2008.00607.x>. Behavioural vision therapy is a wider term, referring not only to the effort to slow myopia, but also to correct other vision problems through changes in behaviour.
Since it doesn't come in contact with the eye, that doesn't seem to be likely. It could be training the muscles that adjust the curvature of your lens.
Nitpicking, but training eye muscles to tighten/loosen and thereby change the shape of the eyeball is more along the lines of what the technique apparently claims to do, and OP is asking about. Orthokeratology changes only the shape of the cornea, not the eye ball itself; it's a bit like talking about making a telescope physically longer/shorter vs. simply switching out the lens at one end for a different one.
