News

Early 2020 marked an important milestone for the Retina UK community, when the first person with an inherited retinal condition received NHS treatment to potentially slow or even stop the progression of their sight loss.

A discovery made as part of research funded by Retina UK has led to a prestigious award of $2.5 million, enabling scientists to undertake more in-depth investigations and work towards a treatment for a particular type of retinitis pigmentosa.

Your generous support allows Retina UK to fund the work of leading scientists who are increasing understanding of inherited sight loss and moving us closer to treatments.

Biotechnology company Kiora Pharmaceuticals has been given the go-ahead to start in-human testing of a novel “small molecule” treatment, known as KIO-301, for advanced vision loss in retinitis pigmentosa (RP). The phase 1b clinical trial will take place in Adelaide, Australia, and will begin enrolling participants towards the end of 2022.

Biotechnology company MeiraGTx has announced encouraging news from its phase 1/2 clinical trial of botaretigene sparoparvovec (previously known as AAV-RPGR), a gene therapy aimed at X-linked retinitis pigmentosa caused by faults in the RPGR gene.

Prof Mariya Moosajee at Moorfields Eye Hospital has asked us to share the message below about the clinical trial she is running. This trial is for a treatment that targets a particular section of the USH2A gene.

Retina UK is delighted to have awarded a new three-year research grant to Prof Majlinda Lako at Newcastle University for a project entitled: To establish AAV.PRPF31 gene augmentation in PRPF31-deficient RPE and photoreceptor cells and assess its efficacy in restoring RPE and photoreceptor function.