Photodynamic Therapy of Subfoveal Choroidal Neovascularization in Age-Related Macular Degeneration with Verteporfin

In this chapter, report 1 of the Treatment of Age-Related Macular Degeneration with Photodynamic Therapy (TAP) study details the one-year results of two double-masked, placebo-controlled, randomized clinical trials to determine whether photodynamic treatment with verteporfin reduces the risk of vision loss in patients with age-related macular degeneration (AMD) due to subfoveal choroidal neovascularization (CNV) measuring 5400 µm or less in greatest linear dimension with evidence of classic CNV and best-corrected visual acuity of approximately 20/40 to 20/200. At the month-12 examination, 61% of eyes assigned to verteporfin compared with 46% of eyes assigned to placebo had lost fewer than 15 letters of visual acuity from baseline). Verteporfin therapy was found to be safe and effective in reducing the risk of vision loss, and the authors recommended verteporfin therapy for treatment of patients with predominantly classic CNV from AMD.