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Intravitreal anti-VEGF improves visual acuity, reduces foveal thickness in inflammatory diseases
Am J Ophthalmol. 2009;148(2):310-316.
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Intravitreal bevacizumab injection yielded positive long-term clinical and visual outcomes in eyes with various inflammatory ocular diseases, according to a study.
"Anti-VEGF treatment may be superior to previous therapies, with an improvement of more than two lines in [best corrected visual acuity] and significant foveal flattening in a wide variety of inflammatory ocular neovascularization with no major complications," the study authors said.
The retrospective multicenter case study included 99 eyes of 96 patients who underwent intravitreal injection of Avastin (bevacizumab, Genentech). Mean patient age was 39 years. Primary outcome measures were best corrected logMAR visual acuity and decrease in central foveal thickness at 6, 12, 18 and 24 months after treatment. Optical coherence tomography was used to measure central foveal thickness.
Thirty-three eyes received 2.5 mg bevacizumab injections; 66 eyes received 1.25 mg injections.
At baseline, mean logMAR BCVA was 0.65 (20/90), and mean central foveal thickness was 338 µm. At 6 months, mean BCVA was 0.42 (20/53), and mean central foveal thickness was 239 µm.
At 12 months, mean BCVA was 0.39 (20/49), and mean central foveal thickness was 241 µm. At 18 months, mean BCVA was 0.40 (20/50), and mean central foveal thickness was 261 µm. At 24 months, mean BCVA was 0.34 (20/44), and mean central foveal thickness was 265 µm.
"Three eyes developed submacular fibrosis and one eye submacular hemorrhage," the authors said.