Modern view on the treatment of wet-AMD patients

Abstract

Age-related macular degeneration is one of the leading causes of visual deterioration in the world. There are currently about 30 million people with this pathology. The main factors stimulating the development of neovascularization and corneal edema in hypoxic patients are the production of VEGF factors - blocking them is the goal of anti-VEGF therapy. High efficacy of anti-VEGF therapy was demonstrated in pivotal Phase III trials such as MARINA, ANCHOR and VIEW 1&2 which gave basis to registration of the anti-VEGF drugs with further wide use in clinical practice. Along with that the search for a regimen that would lower the number of injections while maintaining achieved results was being conducted since the introduction of anti-VEGF drugs in the clinical practice. One of the methods allowing to lower number of injections is the fixed aflibercept regimen of 3 loading injections followed by injections with 2 months intervals, but the search did not stop with that. Currently, another regimen called 'Treat and Extend' (T&E) is seeing more use. Proactive dosage regimens such as 'Treat and Extend' are aimed at preventing the recurrence of disease activity and promoting significant improvement of visual functions, as well as maintaining the achieved treatment results while reducing the required number of injections. Based on the results of ALTAIR study assessing the efficacy of aflibercept in T&E regimen, this drug can be considered suitable for T&E regimen starting from the first year of treatment.