Anti-VEGF eye injections could be replaced by eyedrops

Patients suffering from the wet form of macular degeneration may soon be able to say goodbye to unpleasant injections and hello to eye drops as treatment for the disease. Recent research points to eye drops that are safe and effective in treating wet macular degeneration. Anti-VEGF injections are the current method of treatment because the chemicals have to be small enough to circumvent the barriers within the eye to reach the retina and an injection has been the only method of delivery to successfully do that. But now researchers at the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology have been able to load tiny nanoparticles with the drug Avastin and then suspend those nanoparticles in liquid in the form of eye drops. These drops were then used to treat the eyes of rats and rabbits and were proven to be as effective as an injection. With the anti-VEGF medications already being approved and with successful animal studies, this new treatment for wet macular degeneration could be tested in humans and made available within a few years.*