[Treatment of wet AMD with less than 12 injections of Ranibizumab per year].

Treatment of acute wet AMD with Ranibizumab effectively stabilizes and improves visual function on a long-term follow-up basis. At present, one of the most important topics of scientific discussion is whether the functional gain in these patients can be achieved and maintained with less than 12 intravitreal injections of Ranibizumab per year. The data available so far is reviewed in this analysis. The present status can be summarized as follows: 1) It seems evident that monthly injections during the first 12 months are functionally more effective than approaches with a reduced number of treatments; 2) the gain obtained during the first three months of Ranibizumab treatment is partially lost towards the end of the year under reduced treatment frequencies; 3) fixed regimens of quarterly injections do not provide any advantage compared to individually indicated re-injections; 4) a trend towards low functional efficacy can be recognised when less than 5 treatments per year are applied; 5) individual loading at the beginning of the treatment does not provide any advantages compared to a fixed loading regimen of 3 injections. Copyrigiht Georg Thieme Verlag KG Stuttgart . New York.