AMD treatment delays result in vision loss

Widespread delays in follow-up times for patients with wet age-related macular degeneration are resulting in unnecessary and irreversible vision loss, an investigation has shown.

A Freedom of Information request by the Macular Society found two thirds of the 80 NHS trusts who gave details did not meet the four-week threshold for the eye condition.

It said many of those failing to comply with the NICE guidelines blamed ‘a lack of resources to cope with the sheer numbers of patients requiring treatment’.

Helen Jackman, chief executive of the Macular Society, said: ‘It is unacceptable that two thirds of NHS trusts are failing patients in this way. Many will have inevitably experienced unnecessary and irreversible sight loss due to the delays in introducing new treatments and follow-up times.