Journal of American Association for Pediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus
Major ArticleRetinal fluorescein angiographic changes following intravitreal anti-VEGF therapy
Section snippets
Subjects and Methods
The study protocol was reviewed and approved by the Ethics Committee and Institutional Review Board of the Association for the Prevention of Blindness in Mexico (Asociación para Evitar la Ceguera en México). Patients diagnosed with stage 3 threshold or prethreshold ROP as defined in the International Classification of ROP4 and the ETROP Study were recruited from January 2008 to December 2012.5 Informed parental consent was obtained prior to any study procedure.
Treatment was performed under
Results
Results are summarized in e-Supplement 1 (available at jaapos.org). A total of 47 eyes of 26 patients (16 males) were included. The mean gestational age was 29.3 weeks (range, 26-32 weeks). Mean birth weight was 1216.4 g (range, 780-2400 g).
At baseline, vascular tortuosity was observed in all eyes, as was absence of the foveal avascular zone (FAZ), capillary nonperfusion throughout the vascularized retina, and presence of a demarcation line with leakage secondary to neovascularization (
Discussion
Anti-VEGF therapy with bevacizumab has been applied in patients with treatment-requiring ROP to prevent vascular proliferation and promoting regression of the disease.6, 7, 8, 9 VEGF is essential for retinal blood vessel formation in the embryo and protects retinal vessels from hyperoxia-induced obliteration. However, although VEGF is required to sustain immature retinal vessels, the production of VEGF is suppressed under hyperoxia.3, 10 VEGF is also critical for the survival of
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