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Vascularization key to RPE choroid transplantation
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LONDON — The limiting factor for successful surgery to transplant retinal pigment epithelium and choroid in patients with retinal degeneration is technique, according to a speaker here.
With three clinical trials in progress or ongoing, pioneering work is being done to develop technique, Robert E. MacLaren, FRCOphth, said at the Euretina Congress.
According to MacLaren, revascularization is key to RPE choroid transplantation surgery.
Robert E. MacLaren
“We are not talking about a skin graft, where you put the graft down on a vascular bed,” MacLaren said. “We are talking about putting something down on the bare sclera, and there are no vessels there at all. There is nothing to proliferate.”
Slicing through the choroid and transplanting with two vascular tissues in apposition might be a viable technique, if it could be done, he said.
“Clearly, the surgery is complex,” MacLaren said, “but, then again, so was cataract surgery many decades ago. As long as the principle is right, then it is up to us as clinicians to keep pushing and trying.”
MacLaren later delivered the Euretina Lecture on “Gene Therapy for Retinal Disease — What Lies Ahead.”
Disclosure: No products or companies are mentioned that would require financial disclosure.