The second eye of patients with senile macular degeneration.

Patients with senile macular degeneration and exudative maculopathy in one eye and drusen in the second eye have a 3% to 7% risk per year of exudative maculopathy developing in the second eye during the first three years following their initial presentation. The risk is the same for patients with new vessel membranes or other types of exudative maculopathy in the first eye. Second eyes in which exudative changes develop are more likely to have larger numbers of drusen or greater confluence of drusen (or both) initially. The data from this study were analyzed using the Kaplan-Meier technique of estimation, a method (to our knowledge) not previously employed by other investigators. The demographic features of the overall study population, as well as the photographic features associated with increased risk of development of exudative maculopathy, were in agreement with those previously reported.