subject: Clinical Trial Of Drugs For Amd [print this page] Age related macular degeneration can damage the eyes in an unwanted way. In particular, wet AMD involves abnormal blood vessels growth behind the retina. Such kind of vessel formation and growth leads to blood and fluid leakage. As a result, the macula will be damaged and vision loss occurs. Wet form of AMD progresses more rapidly than dry AMD. Currently, there are some clinical trials of drugs that are potentially used to fight against age related macular degeneration.
One of them is called anti-VEGF clinical trial which is aimed to reduce the abnormal growth of blood vessels associated with wet AMD. In the class of drugs called anti-VEGF (Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor), Avastin is one that had received FDA approval to treat tumors in 2004. Combined with another chemotherapy drug, Avastin is used to treat metastatic colorectal cancer in practice.
Now, Avastin is under the clinical trial which seeks its effectiveness in treating wet form of age related macular degeneration. An associated professor of Ophthalmology at Bascom Palmer Eye Institute named Dr. Philip J Rosenfeld has conducted a research which showed that Avastin can improve eyesight for AMD patients significantly. According to this research, Avastin could show vision improvement within one week, which was quite exiting compared to other treatments for wet AMD.
In detail, a compounding pharmacy specializing in sterile compounding will help transfer the Avastin from the manufacturers vial into prefilled syringes. The reason is that only a very small amount of Avastin is enough for retinal specialists to perform such kind of an injection. This injection can be done in an office setting.
Avastin is also being compared with another treatment for wet macular degeneration called Lucentis. A clinical trial in this field is currently conducted by Emory Eye Center in Atlanta along with 47 other eye institutions.
