Combined cases of polypoidal choroidal vasculopathy and typical age-related macular degeneration.

BACKGROUND

When we classified neovascular exudative age-related macular degeneration (AMD) into three types of polypoidal choroidal vasculopathy (PCV), typical AMD, and retinal angiomatous proliferation (RAP) in our previous study, we reported 5.5% had the combined cases, such as one eye had PCV and the other eye had typical AMD. We examined the clinical characteristics of these combined cases in the current study.

METHODS

All cases underwent fluorescein and indocyanine green angiography (FA and ICGA) at the initial examination. All PCV cases were diagnosed definitively based on characteristic aneurysmal lesions seen on ICGA. Follow-up examinations also were conducted to determine whether polypoidal lesions had developed in the eyes with typical AMD.

RESULTS

Among 349 patients with neovascular AMD, 20 (5.7%) had one eye with PCV and the other eye with typical AMD. The average age was 73 years. The mean best-corrected visual acuity levels at the initial examination in eyes with PCV and typical AMD were 0.20 and 0.43, respectively (p=0.09). All subgroups of classic and occult CNV were observed in the eyes with typical AMD on FA. During the follow-up period (average, 21.7 months), PCV developed in ten eyes with typical AMD at the initial examination.

CONCLUSIONS

Although some cases might include different stages of progression or probable cases of PCV, the combined cases in which one eye has PCV and the other eye has typical AMD suggest that those clinical entities are not independent and possibly overlap.