Six months treatment with ibopamine in patients with hypotony after vitreoretinal surgery for retinal detachment, uveitis or penetrating trauma

PURPOSE: To evaluate the effectiveness of 6 months treatment with ibopamine eye drops in raising the intraocular pressure in patients with therapy-resistant hypotony after vitreoretinal surgery for proliferative vitreoretinopathy secondary to rhegmatogenous retinal detachment or penetrating trauma.

METHODS: A 2% ibopamine eye drop was topically administered 3 times daily during 24 weeks.

RESULTS: Seventeen patients were included. Nine patients were able to continue their treatment up to 24 weeks; their mean intraocular pressure increase was 2.11 mmHg (SE, 0.56; 95% confidence interval, 0.96 to 3.23; P < 0.0005) in comparison with baseline values. Eight patients stopped using ibopamine before 24 weeks because of complains of follicular conjunctivitis or irritation without clinically observable conjunctivitis. In these patients a comparable increase in intraocular pressure was observed up to treatment discontinuation.

CONCLUSION: This study confirms that the use of topical ibopamine may result in a sustained increase in intraocular pressure of >2 mmHg in the majority of patients, but was only well tolerated in half of them. There may only be a few patients, however, who will clinically benefit from this rise in intraocular pressure. A better formulation or method of administration would be needed.