Clinical course of patients with exudative-haemorrhagic age-related macular degeneration treated with ranibizumab. Eye2Eye study ,

Abstract Objective To assess the mean best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA) change in patients with exudative-hemorrhagic age-related macular degeneration (EH-ARMD) after 12-month period of treatment with ranibizumab. Methods A retrospective, multicentre and national study of intravitreal administered ranibizumab was conducted on two groups of EH-ARMD patients: only one eye affected (group 1) vs second eye affected (group 2), having the first one affected. Eligible subjects were ≥50 years old with primary or secondary active subfoveal EH-ARMD-related choroidal neovascularisation (CNV). Results A total of 184 patients (91 group 1 and 93 group 2) were included. Mean age (SD) was 75.3 (7.5) years, and 53.6% were women. The BCVA showed a VA improvement at 12 months of 9.3 (18.0) number of letters in group 1 and 5.1 (16.8) number of letters in group 2 ( p p  = 0.0042, respectively). No statistical differences between groups were observed. Lesion characteristics in the total population (baseline vs 12-month) were: drusen (69.1% vs 61.1%), macular hemorrhages (59.0% vs 7.3%), lipid exudates (28.1% vs 8.2%), and retinal pigment epithelium detachment (46.8% vs 19.0%). The optical coherence tomography (OCT) in the total population (baseline vs 12-month) showed a reduction in macular edema (73.6% vs 20.9%), subretinal fluids (71.3% vs 14.7%), and intraretinal cysts (38.5% vs 19.7%), as well as a reduction of the mean foveal thickness 377.4 ± 109.8 μm vs 249.1 ± 67.8 μm in group 1 and 354.1 ± 123.2 μm vs 254.6 ± 67.4 μm in group 2, p Conclusions Intravitreal administration of ranibizumab for a minimum of 12-months significantly improved the BCVA, decreased lesion characteristics, and reduced the initial mean foveal thickness in patients with CNV primary or secondary to EH-ARMD, both in patients with only one eye affected and in patients with a second eye affected, having the first one affected.