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Late AMD strongly associated with severity of early lesions
Researchers identified factors associated with the 15-year incidence and progression of age-related macular degeneration and found that severe early lesions and smoking at baseline were both strong risk factors for late AMD.
Nichole Joachim, BSc, and colleagues reported in Ophthalmology that of 3,654 Blue Mountains Eye Study (BMES) participants, 2,334 were examined after 5 years, 1,952 after 10 years and 1,149 after 15 years. At each visit, color retinal photographs were taken, comprehensive questionnaires were given, and DNA was genotyped.
The 15-year incidence for early AMD was found to be 22.7%, and for late AMD it was 6.8%, they reported.
Researchers found a strong correlation with age and early and late AMD incidence.
They also found that the presence of both risk alleles of CFH-rs1061170 or ARMS2-rs10490924 and female sex were associated with early AMD, and current smoking and presence of at least one of the risk alleles was associated with late AMD.
The consumption of fish at greater than or equal to one serving per week was conversely associated with late but not early AMD, according to researchers.
No correlation was found between smoking and 15-year early AMD incidence.
Joachim and colleagues reported that the presence of large drusen, indistinct soft drusen, drusen location closer to the foveal center and larger drusen area were highly influential in late AMD development.
Overall, researchers found that the 15-year incidence of both early and late AMD was significantly higher compared with the 10-year incidence rates in the BMES cohort. – by Abigail Sutton
Disclosure: Joachim reported no relevant financial disclosures. Please see the full study for a list of all remaining authors’ financial disclosures.
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Joachim N, et al. Ophthalmology. 2015;doi:10.1016/j.ophtha.2015.08.002.