Pravin U. Dugel, MD At EURETINA 2018: Brolucizumab For Neovascular Age-Related Macular Degeneration

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At this year’s EURETINA congress, we caught up with Dr Pravin Dugel to discuss neovascular age-related macular degeneration (nAMD). Dr Dugel suggests that while there have been recent advances in the treatment of nAMD, there is still a need to obtain better efficacy and find drugs that maintain visual acuity improvement over the long-term. One way of addressing these unmet needs could be brolucizumab, the first humanized single-chain antibody fragment to be developed in medicine. Due to the small molecular size of brolucizumab, it can achieve enhanced tissue penetration and remain in the target for an extended period. Dr Dugel gives us a run-down of the HAWK and HARRIER study results and looks to the future of anti-VEGF therapies.

Questions:
1. What are the major unmet needs in the treatment of neovascular age-related macular degeneration (nAMD)? (0:08)
2. How does brolucizumab differ from other anti-vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) treatment options in nAMD? (0:44)
3. What were the major findings of the HAWK and HARRIER studies comparing brolucizumab with aflibercept in patients with nAMD? (1:31)
4. Could you tell us about the recent analysis of the HAWK and HARRIER data investigating the reliability of response to an initial 12-week treatment interval in predicting long-term response to this dosing regimen? (2:26)
5. What are the next steps in the clinical development of brolucizumab for nAMD and what will this mean in terms of your clinical practice? (3:29)

Speaker disclosures: Scientific advisory board: Alcon Surgical (RACII), Genentech, MacuSight, Novartis, NeoVista, ArticDX, Alcon Pharmaceutical, AMO, Thrombogenics, Santen, Ophthotech, Lux BioScience, Digisight, Roche, Acucela, Stealth Biotherapeutics, Lutronic, Avalanche, TrueVision, Alimera Sciences, Orbis International, Annidis, Neurotech, Aerpio, DOSE Medical, Omeros, Shire Human Genetics, Opthea, Graybug Vision, CDR-Life Inc., Clearside Biomedical.
Consultant: Bausch + Lomb Pharma, Genentech, Alcon Surgical, Alcon Pharmaceutical, NeoVista, MacuSight, ArticDX, ORA, Novartis, Allergan, Regeneron, Santen, Inc., QLT, Inc., Abbott/AMO, Thrombogenics, Ophthotech, Lux BioScience, DigiSight, Roche, TopCon, Acucela, Pentavision, ORA, Stealth Biotherapeutics, Annidis, Clearside Biomedical, Optovue, Neurotech, Lutronic, Alimera Sciences, DOSE Medical, Aerpio, Omeros, Shire Human Genetics, Ophthea, Spark Therapeutics, Graybug Vision, Zeiss Group, Irenix, ByeOnics, PanOptica, Chengdu Kanghong Biotechnology, SciFluor Life Sciences, Boehringer Ingelheim, Kodiak Sciences, Oculis SA, pSivida Corporation, Amgen, Aerie Pharmaceutical, Pieris Pharmaceutical, Gemini Pharmaceutical, Ionis, RegenexBio, Reneuron, Abfero.
Minor stockholder: Alimera, Aerpio, Annidis, ArctixDx, Digisight, Irenix, Ophthotech, Clearside Biomedical, PanOptica, True Vision.

Filmed at the European Society of Retina Specialists (EURETINA) 2018 Congress, Vienna, Austria, 20–23 September 2018.