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We thank Dr Grzybowski for his interest in our article. In his letter he points out some discrepancies between the text of our article and the content of Table 1. We think the confusion comes from the interpretation of the title of Table 1. We mentioned in the title of Table 1 “Factors influencing the incidence of endophthalmitis after intravitreal injections.” “Influencing” is a neutral wording and should not be interpreted as increasing or decreasing. Therefore, taking into account the sense of “influencing,” we do not think that “Table 1 delivers opposite data,” as stated by our colleague. The last point of the letter refers to a paper we published previously on a small series of 11 450 intravitreal injections performed in a single center. In the conclusion of this paper we warned the reader that since the series was small it was not possible to draw definitive conclusions regarding the use of antibioprophylaxis for intravitreal injections of anti-VEGF agents or corticosteroids. Therefore our last sentence addressed the wish for a larger multicenter study and that was done for the Journal paper. Our study was inspired by the efforts of the diabetic retinopathy clinical research network. Although we may find some weaknesses in collecting data from various centers of 1 country, at least we must acknowledge that having 25 different centers (university hospitals and private centers) allowed us to collect a total of 316 576 intravitreal injections. The findings of such a series give a good view of what is done in the “real world” and moreover are much more robust than the results of 1 center, especially for diseases with low prevalence, such as endophthalmitis after intravitreal injections.

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Jan 6, 2017 | Posted by in OPHTHALMOLOGY | Comments Off on Reply

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