What treatment will patients receive?

Sometimes because it is not known which way of treating patients is the best, one needs to make comparisons.  In the study, the patients will be put into groups and then compared.

The groups are selected by a computer which has no information about the individual – i.e. by chance.  Patients in each group then have a different treatment and these are compared.  Patients who consent to participate will receive an injection of either the study medicine or placebo behind the eye to be treated.  The placebo injection contains only an inactive substance.

As volunteers in this study, patients will be given either the placebo or 15 mg of the study medicine.  This means that 1 out of 2 patients will receive the study medicine. It is important to include the placebo injections in this study to find out if the injection procedure is a safe one for giving the study medicine to AMD patients and if it is really working.  At this point neither patients, nor the researchers will know which medicine patients are receiving (masked study).  However, in case of any serious problem, this information will be immediately available to them.