Comparison of Eylea® with Lucentis® as first-line therapy in patients with treatment-naïve neovascular age-related macular degeneration in real-life clinical practice: retrospective case-series analysis

BACKGROUND To identify differences between Ranibizumab and Aflibercept in treatment-naïve patients with neovascular age-related macular degeneration (nvAMD) in a real-life clinical setting. METHODS We compared two groups of patients with a fairly similar prognosis either receiving Aflibercept or Ranibizumab within a pro re nata regimen for 1 year. Changes in visual acuity (letters) and central foveal thickness (CFT) and frequency of injections after completing the loading phase were evaluated using two separate multivariate mixed linear models. RESULTS When correcting for baseline differences between the Aflibercept (11 eyes) and Ranibizumab (16 eyes) group, there was neither divergence in visual acuity (-0.97 letters (95 % CI. -6.06-4.12); p = 0.709), nor a significant difference in the reduction of CFT (-25.16 μm, 95 % CI; (-78.01-27.68); p = 0.351) between the two groups 1 year after treatment initiation. Also, the number of injection did not differ (0.04 (95 % CI; -0.16-0.09); p = 0.565). CONCLUSION In contrast to health claims, treatment-naïve nvAMD, Ranibizumab and Aflibercept were equivalent in terms of functional and morphologic outcomes and number of injections when studied in real-life clinical practice.