Incidence of posterior vitreous detachment in exudative age-related macular degeneration

We evaluated the incidence of posterior vitreous detachment (PVD) in 74 eyes with exudative age-related macular degeneration. Another series of 74 normal eyes matched for sex and age served as control. There was no difference in the incidence of PVD between the affected and control eyes, the affected eyes and the unaffected fellow eyes in 60 unilateral cases, or between the active and cicatricial lesions. Follow-up studies in 44 eyes which showed active lesions initially, there was no difference between eyes with and without PVD regarding the course of visual acuity, final visual acuity or whether the lesion remained active or cicatricialized after 6 months or longer. The findings show that PVD is not associated with age- related macular degeneration.