ESCRS 2023: Fritz Hengerer, MD, PhD, presents new data for cataract surgeons

Physicians and researchers brought their latest data to the annual European Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgeons (ESCRS) meeting in Vienna, Austria, earlier this month. At the meeting, Fritz Hengerer, MD, PhD, the director of Frankfurt’s Bürgerhospital eye hospital, discussed data he presented at the congress and what’s upcoming in the world of minimally-invasive glaucoma procedures.

Editor's note: This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Fritz Hengerer

For many years, I'm visiting the ESCRS on a regular basis. And I'm astonished about the new format they got into this year, with the Arena [Sessions] in the official talks. I've been invited to one on Monday. It's my pleasure to contribute to this very famous conference, which has now, worldwide, spread to all colleagues. I'm meeting with a lot of friends not only in the community, but a lot of people from the companies presenting new innovations from all over the world. It makes me happy as an ophthalmologist to take care for everything, my daily business.

I'm very happy to present this year, our 7 years [of] data on the iStent inject® technology, which we have been following now for 7 years in a group with combined cataract surgery and without cataract surgery as a standalone procedure. And we are very astonished about the long-term follow up and the adherence to our patients to our study. And when you look at the results, they have really good [inaudible] in terms of reduction of intraocular pressure over time. It's stable for more than 7 years now, at a range of 14.1 millimeters [inaudible], and only with 1 medication on average, coming from 3 medications and the high intraocular pressure. And also, we see 40% lowering of intraocular pressure and medication reduction twofold. This is something beneficial both for the patients and for the ocular surface as well. So this is a paper I present on Monday. And this is what makes me happy to contribute to this conference.

With regard to glaucoma developments, there are a lot of new products in the pipeline. I'm very happy to test them in the early phase and we are going to Phase II and III in clinical trials for medical medication implants in the anterior chamber, like slow-release implants to release drugs lowering intraocular pressure over time, in order to remove the burden for the patients to use the eyedrops on a regular basis and to harm the ocular surface. So this will be the next step. And there are a lot of other technologies which make me very happy with regard to non-invasive technologies in preserving visual field and visual acuity in these crucial cases of glaucoma diseases.