Design and results of trabeculectomy operation for use with 5-fluorouracil

We revised our trabeculectomy technique in an effort to minimize the complications associated with the use of 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) in these procedures and then compared the results obtained with this procedure both with (25 patients) and without (25 patients) the use of 5-FU. There was no significant difference between the two groups in terms of mean postoperative IOP at 1 year, number of patients that required needling of the bleb to control postoperative IOP, and number of patients requiring postoperative topical medications to control IOP. Since more (although not significantly more) patients who did not receive 5-FU required needling of the bleb to maintain filtration, and since we were able to achieve satisfactory results in the great majority of cases using only a small total dose of 5-FU, we suggest that it may be simpler to use low doses of 5-FU in all trabeculectomy procedures.