ISTA Pharmaceuticals Announces Physician-Sponsored Clinical Study of Xibrom(TM) Combination Therapy with L...( Presentation is One of Five Posters ...),Health

Presentation is One of Five Posters Scheduled for the 2008 Annual Meeting

of the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO)

IRVINE, Calif., Feb. 22 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- ISTA Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: ISTA), announced today the acceptance of an abstract describing the results of a study using Xibrom(TM) (bromfenac ophthalmic solution) 0.09% therapy in combination with Lucentis(R) (ranibizumab injection) in patients with age-related macular degeneration (AMD). According to the abstract, patients who received Xibrom required 1.6 +/- 0.69 injections of Lucentis during the six-month study period, while patients who received only Lucentis received 4.5 +/- 0.41 injections. Patients with Lucentis alone received significantly more (2.83 times) injections of ranibizumab (p=0.0002) than those receiving the combination. There was a numerical trend in favor of the combination treatment group on improvement in visual acuity but this difference did not achieve statistical significance. These data are expected to be presented at the ARVO 2008 annual meeting, which begins at the end of April.

The study results were gathered from 60 patients receiving Lucentis therapy for wet AMD. Patients were monitored monthly using optical coherence tomography (OCT) and fluorescein angiography. When leakage from vessels was detected, patients were re-injected with Lucentis. 30 patients received Xibrom dosed twice daily in addition to the Lucentis injection, and their results were compared to 30 patients who received Lucentis only. There were no adverse events associated with the extended topical administration of bromfenac. The study was designed as a retrospective case control series.

The clinical findings will be pre
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