Evaluation of Safety and Efficacy of Intrastromal Implantation of CorVision® Bioengineered Corneal Inlay for Correction of Presbyopia.

Overview

This clinical investigation is a prospective, multicentre, non-comparative case series to assess safety and efficacy of CorVision® bioengineered corneal inlay for improving uncorrected near vision in presbyopic subjects. In this study a sterile medical grade collagen-based bioengineered corneal inlay (CorVision®), which closely mimics the human corneal tissue, will be tested as a natural microlens for correction of near vision in presbyopic patients. The primary endpoint for this study is to further determine the safety of the inlay and the secondary endpoint is to determine the efficacy of the inlay to improve uncorrected near vision. CorVision® implantation will be done via a minimally invasive laser-assisted intra-stromal surgery. Besides important information concerning details of the surgical method and postoperative care, tolerance of the device and possible adverse events will be reported along with several clinical parameters to be measured preoperatively and postoperatively. The study will consist of 110 subjects receiving the inlay to be included within a recruitment period of 18 months at multiple clinical sites. All subjects will be followed for minimum 12-months postoperatively. Postoperative evaluations are scheduled at 1 week, 1, 3, 6, and 12 months.

Upon signing of informed consent and study inclusion, both eyes will be screened to determine which eye is dominant and to ensure that the non-dominant eye meets the visual acuity, refraction, and other inclusion criteria. In this investigation, the monovision concept will be utilized, e.g. CorVision® will be implanted in the non-dominant eye to improve near vision and the dominant eye is left intact or corrected by a standard refractive surgery to emmetropia. In brief, subjects will undergo laser corneal surgery on their non-dominant eye to create an anterior stromal pocket into which the investigational device will be implanted. Combined antibiotic - steroid eye drops will be instilled for 4 weeks post-implantation. The investigational treatment does not introduce foreign cells into the patient, requires only a short course of local immunosuppression (4 weeks compared to 12 months or longer for some other treatment options), and is reversible as the investigational device can be removed later if required. Moreover, should serious intra-operative or post-operative complications arise during or following implantation of the investigational device that cannot be treated with medications (for example thinning or clouding of the cornea), the CorVision® device can be removed and the patient can undergo standard-of-care for complications after laser surgery. Following implantation of the CorVision®, postoperative eye examinations will be conducted at 1 week, 1 month, then at month 3, 6, and 12 and outside of these standard examination times on an as-needed basis at any time. Examinations will include corneal tomography, central corneal thickness, slit lamp corneal transparency, keratometry, anterior segment optical coherence tomography, and general ophthalmic examination including tear break up time, refraction, uncorrected and corrected distance, intermediate and near visual acuity, and in some eyes aberrometer measurements, defocus curve or contrast sensitivity. The proof-of-concept and feasibility to implant CorVision® by standard surgical methods such as a femto-second assisted pocket surgery and postoperative treatment and assessment protocol for this new medical device have already been developed via prior pre-clinical evaluations and some pilot clinical studies.