The ERF and ERF-free groups had akin champion ocular acuity gains from baseline to week 52.
In opposition to erstwhile post-hoc findings, caller findings suggest determination was nary important quality successful semipermanent champion ocular acuity (BVA) gains betwixt aboriginal residual fluid (ERF) and ERF-free cohorts with neovascular age-related macular degeneration (nAMD).
The survey investigators led by Rishi Singh, MD, President Martin Health, Cleveland Clinic Florida additionally suggest determination was nary important quality betwixt the week 12 fluid subgroups.
Treatment for nAMD tin often necessitate intensive therapy with anti-vascular endothelial maturation origin (VEGF) injections. As alluded to above, the investigators enactment anterior station hoc studies person reported an relation betwixt ERF aft the loading signifier and poorer attraction outcomes.
The retrospective cohort included treatment-naive patients with nAMD who were initiated connected anti-VEGF betwixt 2012 and 2018, with astatine slightest 1-year of follow-up. An wide colonisation of 286 patients with nAMD was included successful the study.
A instrumentality learning algorithm quantified intraretinal fluid (IRF), subretinal fluid (SRF), and full retinal fluid from OCTs. The ERF-group included individuals with fluid astatine week 12 and was further stratified by fluid subtype. Investigators utilized paired t-tests and investigation of variance to comparison champion ocular acuity and fluid among subgroups, arsenic good arsenic a quartile investigation to correlate fluid volumes to week 52 champion ocular acuity.
The hazard of ERF was predicted from baseline factors utilizing 3 instrumentality learning methods, including ridge logistic regression, k nearest neighbors classification, and enactment vector classification. The main result measures were the mean alteration successful champion ocular acuity from baseline to week 52 according to week 12 fluid status.
At week 12, the findings bespeak 58.4% of patients had ERF. When breaking down the population, those successful the ERF radical included SRF lone (45.5%), IRF-only (21.6%), and IRF and SRF (32.9%). The ERF and ERF-free groups had akin champion ocular acuity gains from baseline to week 52 (+5.7 ± 15.4 vs. +4.9 ± 18; P = .69), according to the data.
Then, successful examining circumstantial ERF subgroups, investigators observed nary important differences among the IRF-only (+4.6 ± 16.4), SRF-only (+5.6 ± 12.5), and IRF and SRF (+6.6 ± 18.5; P = .93) groups.
Moreover, quartile investigation of week 12 fluid revealed nary predictive signifier for champion ocular acuity gains. Investigators developed 3 instrumentality learning methods to foretell those astatine hazard for ERF and recovered that they achieved equivalent performances, with F1 scores of 0.73 to 0.76.
The abstract, “Characterizing Early Residual Fluid successful Neovascular Age-Related Macular Degeneration Using Machine Learning successful Routine Clinical Practice,” was published successful Ophthalmology.