Vision-related quality of life in patients treated for myopic choroidal neovascularization : A post hoc analysis of the OLIMPIC study

Purpose: To investigate vision-related quality of life in patients referred to the Italian Retina Services for intravitreal ranibizumab treatment for choroidal neovascularization due to pathologic myopia. Design: Post hoc analysis of a multicenter, interventional phase IIIb study (OLIMPIC). Methods: Patients with either previously untreated (naïve) or treated choroidal neovascularization due to pathologic myopia were enrolled. Vision-related quality of life was measured using the Italian version of the Impact of Vision Impairment Questionnaire with scores from 0 (no impact) to 5 (severe impact). Burden of illness data were collected regarding income, and personal and public resource use. Results: In the 200 included subjects, mean best-corrected visual acuity in the better eye was 68.3 Early Treatment Diabetic Retinopathy Study letters (standard deviation: 15.2) compared with 42.5 Early Treatment Diabetic Retinopathy Study letters (standard deviation: 23.3) in the worse eye. The proportion of better eyes affected by choroidal neovascularization was 147/200 (73.5%). In multivariable analyses, lower better eye, but not worse eye, best-corrected visual acuity was associated with lower vision-related quality of life (per 10 fewer letters, beta: + 0.17, p < 0.001). An annual income below 20,000 euros was also associated with lower vision-related quality of life (beta: + 0.38; standard error: 0.13, p = 0.004). Moreover, in univariate analyses, increasing income level was linearly associated with better presenting best-corrected visual acuity in the better eye (p < 0.003), with a difference of 15 Early Treatment Diabetic Retinopathy Study letters for patient income <20,000 euros compared with >70,000 euros. Conclusion: Italian patients with myopic choroidal neovascularization and a low income presented with lower better-eye best-corrected visual acuity and lower vision-related quality of life compared with those with a higher income. Future research should investigate disease awareness and candidacy issues that may influence the quality of life of patients.