The inevitable was bound to happen. A pharmacy in Hollywood, FL repackaged Avastin into single-use syringes and in the process contaminated the drug that was then sold to several clinics for the treatment of wet AMD, causing severe eye damage, includin…
Author: Irv Arons
Stem Cells in Ophthalmology Update 9: First Patients Treated
As I reported back on June 16th, Advanced Cell Technology had enrolled the first two patients in its Phase I/II clinical trials using retinal pigment epithelial (RPE) cells derived from embryonic stem cells (hESCs) for treating Stargardt’s Macular Dy…
Avastin/Lucentis Update 47: Should the UK’s NICE Consider Adding Avastin to It’s Approved Drugs?
In a blog, appearing on the BMJ (British Medical Journal) Group Blogs, James Raftery, a health economist with several decades’ experience with the National Health Service (NHS) and a professor of health technology assessment at Southampton University, regularly writes about…
A Potential Breakthrough in the Treatment of Glaucoma
Three related news items caught my attention last week. They had to do with the medical treatment of glaucoma.
The first item noted that patients don’t properly use their prescription eyedrops in treating elevated intraocular pressure (IOP). Dr. Ari…
Stem Cells in Ophthalmology Update 8: …and So It Begins
Advanced Cell Technology announced today that it had enrolled the first patients in its two Phase I/II clinical trials, using retinal pigment epithelial (RPE) cells derived from embryonic stem cells (hESCs) for treating Stargardt’s Macular Dystropyy …
AMD Update 15: Visualization of Living Rods and Cones
Back in February 2009, I first wrote about David Williams and his research group at the Institute of Optics at the University of Rochester, and their announcement that they had used adaptive optics to image RPE cells in vivo. That report, AMD Update 4:…
Menu 19: Updates for March 2011 – May 2011
A lot of interesting news was made over the past few months that I posted online. This update covers the period from March through May of 2011, including extensive coverage of developments from the recent ARVO Meeting held the beginning…
Menu 19: Updates for March 2011 – May 2011
A lot of interesting news was made over the past few months that I posted online. This update covers the period from March through May of 2011, including extensive coverage of developments from the recent ARVO Meeting held the beginning of May, and sev…
Oraya IRay Update: Company Completes Enrollment in European Clinical Trial
Since first writing about this company in November 2009 (Oraya IRay In-office Stereotactic X-ray Treatment for AMD: A First Report), I have been following its progress. As I wrote back then, its Phase III Clinical Trial, which planned to enroll approxi…
Avedro Update: Company Completes U.S. Phase III Study of Microwave Treatment for Progressive Keratoconus and Ectasia after Refractive Surgery
I have been following the progress of Avedro since I first learned about the formation of the company back in May 2009. Now the company has announced completion of the one-year follow up visits of patients enrolled in its two…
Stem Cells in Ophthalmology Update 7: Research Studies with Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells Suggest Opposite Results
Two research studies were published this week, about the use of induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) in treating retinal problems, but with opposing results. In one study, published in Nature, Dr.Yang Xu and his colleagues at the University of California,…
Iluvien Update 3: Alimera Files Resubmission for Approval of Iluvien
Following up the good news released at the recent ARVO Meeting (Iluvien Update 2: New Safety and Efficacy Data Presented at ARVO), Alimera Sciences Inc. filed a resubmission of its New Drug Application (NDA) for the use of Iluvien in treating diabetic …
Ellex 2RT Updated Clinical Results: ARVO 2011
Last June, I reported on the six-month results of Professor Robyn Guymer’s pilot study of using nanosecond laser pulses to prevent vision loss from patients afflicted with early stages of dry AMD, the Ellex 2RT for Early AMD Study. The results were p…
Iluvien Update 2: New Safety and Efficacy Data Presented at ARVO
In July 2010, I wrote a comprehensive report about Iluvien and its potential in the treatment of diabetic macula edema (DME) (Iluvien and the Future of Ophthalmic Drug Delivery Systems). It was anticipated at that time that the company would obtain mar…
CATT Update 15: Preliminary Two-Year Safety Data Presented at ARVO
Two of the authors of the CATT Study, that was published in the NEJM last Thursday, Drs. Dan Martin and Maureen McGovern, presented additional information about the study at the opening day ARVO Meeting, to about 2000 eager attendees. As…
CATT Study Update 14: One-Year Study Results Show Equivalency Between Avastin and Lucentis
The Comparison of AMD Treatment Trials (CATT Study) one-year results were released today in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). As anticipated, the two anti-VEGF drugs, Avastin and Lucentis, both produced by Genentech, showed equivalent results…
CATT Study Update 13: A First Peek
As reported by Andrew Pollack of the NYTimes, in a column published earlier today, the first results of the 1200 patient CATT Study (Comparison of AMD Treatments Trials), whose first-year results are scheduled for release at ARVO on Sunday afternoon, i…
Avastin/Lucentis Update 46: Avastin — The Rest of the Story
I decided to begin this online Journal for two reasons, the first was to put some of my published columns and reports online and make them available to ophthalmic researchers and historians, and the second was because I became interested in the potenti…
AMD Update 14: Neurotech Pharmaceuticals NT-501 Implant Shown to Slow Vision Loss in Patients with Geographical Atrophy Associated with Dry AMD
Back in December 2009, I reproduced Dr. Philip Rosenfeld’s excellent article that presented an overview of the drugs in development to treat dry AMD. At the time, and still today, there was no drug or treatment approved for the treatment of the dry s…
A Golden Retriever Named Trevor and Retinitis Pigmentosa
TrevorAlmost every day, I check on who is looking at my online Journal, where the referrals came from, and what articles are being read most frequently. (I can do this because I use Sitemeter as a visitor counter and for viewer statistics.)Recent…