Avastin is a drug used to treat eye conditions that originally began as a cancer treatment drug.

Through the education and ingenuity of medical doctors specializing in eye care, it was later found to be an effective “off-label” medication for issues affecting vision when injected into the eye. Off-label uses, while legal, are not approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Avastin injection eye side effects, however, can range from visual floaters—spots that appear like air bubbles in a patient’s field of vision—to infections that in a couple of extreme cases have had serious consequences.

What are Avastin Eye Injections Used to Treat?

Avastin eye injections were found to be helpful in treating eye conditions such as macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy, diabetic macular edema, and retinal vein occlusion. These conditions all deal with the abnormal growth of blood vessels in the back of the eye. Swelling and or leakage of this overgrowth of blood vessels can cause vision to deteriorate very rapidly, and at times may end in blindness.

Avastin’s works to block vascular endothelial growth factor, commonly known as VEGF. Blocking VEGF works to prevent further overgrowth of blood vessels that are the root of the issue in these eye diseases. In the case of cancer, for which Avastin is an approved treatment by the FDA, preventing this growth helps to cut off the blood supply that errant rapidly-reproducing cells need to survive.

What are Avastin Injection Eye Side Effects?

Avastin eye floaters can occur when silicone oil is present on the plunger, barrel, and needle of the syringe used to  inject it.  The silicone oil transfers from the needle into the medication. Compounding pharmacies prepare the medication for injection, and the syringes used may not be intended for this type of application.

Avastin injection eye side effects occur when silicone oil particles migrate into the medicine, which causes silicone “floaters”–bubble-like disturbances in sight. The sooner a prepared syringe is used after filling, the less likely floaters are to appear. Freezing the hypodermic units has been found to exacerbate the problem.

Other Avastin injection eye side effects include infection. Again, because the syringes are prepared off-site, it is difficult to determine just how sterile the preparation field was during the process. This has put recipients at greater risk for serious eye infections.

Infections have occurred and in two very dramatic instances caused complete blindness in one patient and brain damage due to the migration of infection in another patient. Fortunately, these two cases were isolated to a group of compounding pharmacies determined to be the source of the bacteria, and all syringes were recalled from that group.

Avastin injection side effects like silicone floaters have been implicated in contributing to cases of corneal damage, retinal tearing and detachment, the formation of cataracts, glaucoma, and hypotony—opposite conditions of too much or too little pressure in the eyes.

Do YOU have a legal claim? Fill out the form on this page now for a free, immediate, and confidential case evaluation. The attorneys who work with Top Class Actions will contact you if you qualify to let you know if an individual lawsuit or Avastin silicone injection class action lawsuit is best for you. [In general, Avastin lawsuits are filed individually by each plaintiff and are not class actions.] Hurry — statutes of limitations may apply.

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