Characteristics of Recurrence in Patients with Polypoidal Choroidal Vasculopathy and Myopic Choroidal Neovascularization

Abstract

Purpose: To investigate the characteristics of recurrence in patients with polypoidal choroidal vasculopathy (PCV) and myopic choroidal neovascularization (CNV). Methods: In total, 72 eyes from 70 patients with PCV and 51 eyes from 49 patients with myopic CNV were included. PCV and myopic CNV patients were followed up with a pro-re-nata regimen after three monthly injections of anti-vascular endothelial growth factor and underwent spectral-domain optical coherence tomography (SD-OCT). Changes in visual acuity and SD-OCT findings of macular lesions after recurrence were analyzed. Results: We observed a significant difference in recurrence of PCV (59.7%) and myopic CNV (35.3%) during the follow-up period (p = 0.008). With the first recurrence, we observed higher levels of subretinal fluid (SRF) in patients with PCV (93.0%) than myopic CNV (22.2%; p < 0.001). In addition, we observed more subretinal hyperreflective lesions with blurred margins on SD-OCT for patients with myopic CNV (88.9%) than with PCV (18.6%; p < 0.001). Changes in central macular thickness (CMT) following recurrence were greater for patients in the PCV group than in the myopic CNV group (p = 0.024). However, visual acuity was lower in patients with myopic CNV than with PCV (p = 0.001). Conclusions: We observed a greater number of new SRF than subretinal hemorrhage in patients with recurrent PCV, whereas a subretinal hyperreflective lesion with a blurred margin was a major finding in patients with myopic CNV. Myopic CNV patients experienced a greater decrease in visual acuity at recurrence than PCV patients despite minimal changes in CMT.