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A Randomized, Controlled Trial of Corticosteroids in the Treatment of Acute Optic Neuritis
- Source :
- New England Journal of Medicine. 326:581-588
- Publication Year :
- 1992
- Publisher :
- Massachusetts Medical Society, 1992.
-
Abstract
- Background and Methods. The use of corticosteroids to treat optic neuritis is controversial. At 15 clinical centers, we randomly assigned 457 patients with acute optic neuritis to receive oral prednisone (1 mg per kilogram of body weight per day) for 14 days; intravenous methylprednisolone (1 g per day) for 3 days, followed by oral prednisone (1 mg per kilogram per day) for 11 days; or oral placebo for 14 days. Visual function was assessed over a six-month follow-up period. Results. Visual function recovered faster in the group receiving intravenous methylprednisolone than in the placebo group; this was particularly true for the reversal of visual-field defects (P = 0.0001). Although the differences between the groups decreased with time, at six months the group that received intravenous methylprednisolone still had slightly better visual fields (P = 0.054), contrast sensitivity (P = 0.026), and color vision (P = 0.033) but not better visual acuity (P = 0.66). The outcome in the oral-prednisone group did ...
- Subjects :
- Chemotherapy
medicine.medical_specialty
Visual acuity
genetic structures
business.industry
medicine.drug_class
medicine.medical_treatment
General Medicine
medicine.disease
Placebo
law.invention
Surgery
Randomized controlled trial
Methylprednisolone
law
Prednisone
Anesthesia
medicine
Corticosteroid
Optic neuritis
medicine.symptom
business
medicine.drug
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 15334406 and 00284793
- Volume :
- 326
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- New England Journal of Medicine
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi...........76cb288ccbc4aaba95c74e87ae047f58