Long-term retinal morphology and functional associations in treated neovascular age-related macular degeneration: findings from the Inhibition of VEGF in Age-Related Choroidal Neovascularisation trial

Tunde Peto, Rebecca N. Evans, Barnaby C. Reeves, Simon Harding, Savita Madhusudhan, Andrew Lotery, Susan Downes, Konstantinos Balaskas, Clare C. Bailey, Alexander Foss, Faruque Ghanchi, Yit Yang, Dawn Phillips, Chris A. Rogers, Alyson Muldrew, Barbra Hamill, Usha Chakravarthy*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

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Abstract

Purpose
To describe the frequency of long-term morphologic features and their relationships with visual function in participants who exited the Inhibition of VEGF in Age-Related Choroidal Neovascularisation (IVAN; ISRCTN92166560) trial.

Design
Multicenter cohort study up to 7 years after enrollment.

Participants
Patients enrolled in the IVAN trial, excluding participants who died or withdrew during the trial.

Methods
Multimodal fundus images, best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA), and low-luminance visual acuity (LLVA) were obtained for a subset of 199 participants who attended a research visit. Clinical sites (n = 20) also provided all visual acuity and clinical information from usual care records for 532 participants and submitted the most recent color, OCT, and other fundus images for 468 participants to a reading center.

Main Outcome Measures
Assessed the following from the most recent images: intralesional macular atrophy (ILMA) within the footprint of the neovascular lesion; hyperreflective material (HRM); intraretinal fluid (IRF); subretinal fluid (SRF); pigment epithelial detachment (PED); and disorganized retinal outer layers (DROLs). Cross-sectional relationships between morphologic features and BCVA/LLVA were estimated.

Results
Intralesional macular atrophy was present in 31.8% of the study eyes at IVAN exit (mean follow-up, 1.96 years) and 89.5% at the most recent imaging visit (mean follow-up, 6.18 years). Hyperreflective material, IRF, SRF, PED, and DROLs were present in 78.8%, 47.7%, 7.6%, 94.5%, and 55% of the study eyes, respectively. In the subset with complete imaging data, in eyes without DROL, the BCVA was worst in the thinnest outer fovea tertile (thinnest minus middle and thickest tertiles, −19.7 and −19.5 letters, respectively), whereas in eyes with DROL, the BCVA was worst in the thickest (thinnest and middle tertiles minus thickest, 12.5 and 12.2, respectively). Regression models showed that the presence of ILMA and HRM was independently associated with BCVA (22 letters worse [95% confidence interval {CI}, –11.2 to –32.8; P 
Conclusions
Macular atrophy and HRM were common after 7 years of follow-up and strongly associated with visual outcomes.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)664-675
Number of pages12
JournalOpthalmology Retina
Volume6
Issue number8
Early online date03 Aug 2022
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Aug 2022

Keywords

  • disorganization of outer retina
  • macular atrophy
  • long-term follow-up
  • spectral domain OCT
  • IVAN trial

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