Pravin U Dugel: Intravitreal OPT-302 Study Results

Pravin U Dugel: We know that with our current treatment, anti-VEGF-A monotherapy, we know that we’re getting very good results. We know the clinical trial results are excellent. We also know that there’s a delta between what we’re getting in real life and what we should be getting as per the clinical trials. The reason for that delta is that there are opportunities in improving efficacy in the short term, as well as in the long term, and in opportunities in improving sustainability in treatment by improving durability. That’s where the opportunities lie.

When there’s the potential to combine our current treatment to potentially allow us those opportunities, it’s exciting. Particularly if it’s a pathway that’s well proven in the systemic literature. The reason this drug (OPT-302) is exciting to me is because this is a pathway that’s well proven in the systemic literature, and it has the potential to help us in terms of getting better efficacy as well as getting more of a sustainable treatment regimen with longer durability.

Any early stage study should demonstrate 2 things: 1 is an excellent safety profile and the other is an encouraging biological signal. This study has done both. And so, from this point on, there will be a larger study that’s planned, and then we’ll see what that data shows. But if that data is consistent, then what we can expect is an entirely different, but complimentary, pathway that may work in combination with our current treatment modality to allow us better efficacy and possibly greater durability. Not only for neovascular macular degeneration, but for diabetic macular edema and perhaps diabetic retinopathy.