Open AccessIf an intraocular lens is displaced or if its power is changed what are the consequences for the refractive compensation of the eye? Gaussian optics is used to obtain explicit formulae for the sensitivityof the corneal-plane refractive compensation (also called the refraction, refractive state, etc) to change in power and axial displacement of a thin intraocular lens implanted in a simple eye. In particular, for a pseudophakic Gullstrand simplified eye withintraocular lens placed 5 mm behind the cornea the sensitivity to errors in the power of the intraocular lens is about 71 . 0 − 71 for an intraocular lens of power for an intraocular lens of power 20 D, that is, the refractive compensation decreases by about 0.71 dioptres per dioptre increase in the power of the intraocular lens. More generally the sensitivity is approximately ( ) I m 0037 . 0 63 . 0 F − − 0.63 ( 003 . 0 63 . 0 − − (0.0037m)FI where FI is the power of the intraocular lens. Also for Gullstrand’s simplified eye the sensitivity of refractive compensation to axial displacement of the intraocular lens is approximately linear in FI , about (64D) FI, in fact. That is, for each dioptre of the power of the intraocular lens the refractive compensation increases by about 0.064 dioptres per millimetre of axial displacement towards the retina.