EyeCon 2023: Stratifying the spectrum of care in glaucoma management

Analisa Arosemena, MD, underscores the importance of year-round glaucoma control through extended-release medications and laser treatments at EyeCon 2023.

Video Transcript

Editor's note - This transcript has been edited for clarity.

Analisa Arosemena, MD: Hi, everyone. I'm here at EyeCon in Sanibel talking about glaucoma. My name is Analisa Arosemena and I practice in Miami. And I'm here to discuss the use of extended-release medications and laser...selective laser trabeculoplasty to get control of glaucoma, 24/7 365 days a year.

Treatment for glaucoma should not be measured 4 times a year when we see our patient in the clinic. We should actually try to give them control 24 hours a day for the whole year throughout their lifetime. And in order to be able to achieve that with poor compliance the laser might be the answer for your patients.

It has been shown in the LiGHT trial now at 6 years that you're able to control more than 70% of your patients just with laser treatment alone at 6 years. Also extended-release medications will allow the patients to be drug-free, meaning compliance-free throughout this time.

I'm going to be discussing the bimatoprost extended release that is approved currently in the market. We're going to discuss some of the treatments that are close to approval, like the travoprost device [and] some other technologies that are in the process of going through approval system. But providing the patient with an extended-release medication will also then manage side effects that we get from drops and allow patients to have a more comfortable, better quality of life and be able to use some of the other technologies that we have been discussing this morning, like better surface in their cornea in order to be able to take premium IOLs.