Six and eight weeks injection frequencies of bevacizumab are non-inferior to the current four weeks injection frequency for quality of life in neovascular age-related macular degeneration: a randomized controlled trial

PURPOSE: Patients with neovascular age-related macular degeneration (nARMD) will not deteriorate on visual acuity and retinal thickness when treated with bevacizumab injection frequencies of 6 or 8 weeks compared to 4 weeks. This study aimed to investigate this non-inferiority in quality of life (QoL). We hypothesized that less frequent bevacizumab injections are not inferior regarding patients reported QoL. METHODS: Patients were randomized to bevacizumab every 4 (n = 64), 6 (n = 63), and 8 weeks (n = 64). Patients were at least 65 years old, have a best-corrected visual acuity of 20/200 to 20/20, no previous ARMD treatment and active leakage. Vision-related QoL questionnaire NEI VFQ-39 was used to assess QoL at baseline and after 1 year. General QoL questionnaire SF-36 was included for secondary analysis. Multilevel analyses were performed, correcting for age, gender and baseline. RESULTS: The 6 (3.68; 95% CI − 0.63 to 8.00) and 8 (2.15; 95% CI − 2.26 to 6.56) weeks bevacizumab regimens resulted in non-inferior QoL differences compared to 4 weeks on the NEI VFQ-39. Also on the SF-36 the differences were well within the non-inferiority limits. CONCLUSION: Non-inferiority of the 6 and 8 weeks frequencies was demonstrated compared to 4 weeks on vision-related and general QoL in patients with nARMD. These results are in line with previously published results of lower frequency injections regarding visual acuity and central retinal thickness. Lower injection frequency may reduce burden, side effects, and treatment costs. In consideration of these results, 8 weeks frequency injections of intravitreal bevacizumab could be considered in patients with nARMD. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s11136-020-02580-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.