Purpose: To examine the influencing factors on the development of chorioretinal atrophy, which is the main cause of long-term visual decrease in myopic choroidal neovascularization (CNV), in a large series of highly myopic patients.
Methods: Sixty-five patients (81 eyes) with myopic CNV were studied retrospectively. The influence of the patient's age, refractive error, axial length, visual acuity at onset of CNV, size of CNV, and grade of myopic retinopathy on the extent of chorioretinal atrophy more than 3 years after CNV onset was investigated by means of multiple linear regression analysis.
Results: Seventy-seven of 81 eyes (95.1%) developed chorioretinal atrophy around myopic CNV during the follow-up period. Multiple linear regression revealed that age was the most influencing factor for the development of chorioretinal atrophy in all the subjects. When we divided the subjects into two groups according to their age, however, CNV size was the only factor to influence the development of chorioretinal atrophy in the patients younger than 40 years, whereas age was still the only influencing factor in those older than 40 years.
Conclusions: The factors influencing the development of chorioretinal atrophy differ according to patient age. Local factors, such as CNV size, determine the tendency to develop chorioretinal atrophy in young patients. Systemic factors, such as patient age, play a greater part in older subjects.