gms | German Medical Science

Background: VEGF-inhibitors are succesfully used for the treatment of macular edema in various vascular diseases. In our clinical trial we estimated the efficacy of Bevacizumab as a VEGF-inhibitor in retinal vein occlusions with macular involvement.

Methods: 25 patients with retinal vein occlusion and resulting macular edema were involved in the study. All patients were treated with an intravitreal Avastin-injection plus an isovolemic hemodilution. 80% of the patients were medicated in addition with the platelet aggregation inhibitor ASS 100 and 44% with an highly dosed intravenous Prednisolon treatment for 3 days. After 4 to 6 weeks the patients were examined using OCT and fluorescein angiography.

Results: The averaged visual acuity increased statistically significantly from preoperative 0.13 to postoperative 0.20 (p=0.001). After 4 to 6 weeks visual acuity stabilised to 0.21 in average. After 6 postoperative weeks the OCT showed significant decrease of the central retinal thickness by 167 µm (32%) from preoperative averaged 520 µm to 353 µm (p=0.002).

Conclusion: After intravitreal Avastin-Injections in patients with macular edema after retinal vein occlusions a significant morphologic decrease in central retinal thickness could be shown. An initial increase in visual acuity could be seen directly after the intervention. Also after 6 weeks the increase in visual acuity was stabilised. On the long-term the development of macular edema must be further clinically observed.