Intravitreal Antiangiogenic Treatment for Diabetic Retinopathy: A Mexican Real-Life Scenario Experience

Abstract

The objective of this study was to analyze the effectiveness of two intravitreal antiangiogenic drugs, ranibizumab and aflibercept, in a Mexican population over a period of 5 years, evaluating the improvement in visual acuity (VA) and central retinal thickness (CRT) in a real-world scenario. This is a retrospective study with subjects diagnosed with diabetic retinopathy (DR), proliferative diabetic retinopathy (PDR), and diabetic macular edema (DME) receiving intravitreal injections of ranibizumab and/or aflibercept. In this study, we analyzed 588 eyes of 294 patients who received intravitreal antiangiogenic injections. The results showed an improvement regardless of antiangiogenic treatment or diagnosis in both VA and CRT. We found that both aflibercept and ranibizumab improved VA, while subjects with DME responded less to antiangiogenic treatment (p < 0.05), and that this difference did not correspond to the CRT measured by OCT. These results support evidence that intravitreal antiangiogenic medications are effective for ophthalmic complications of diabetes in our population; however, damage to visual structures is not reversed in most patients. And that the perception by the patient (VA) and that of the ophthalmologist (CRT) do not completely correlate in our study.

Keywords

• diabetic retinopathy
• anti-VEGF
• ranibizumab
• aflibercept
• diabetic macular edema
• Mexican population