Table 3 Summarising treatment modalities for BRVO.

Reference	Type of vein occlusion ischaemic or non‐ischaemic	Study type	No of patients and follow up		Visual outcome		Complications and comments
Arteriovenous crossing sheathotomy and vitrectomy
Osterloh and Charles73	BRVO (perfusion status unknown)	Case report	1 patient, 8 months follow up		54 year old female, VA improved from 20/200 to 20/25		3 week history of BRVO
Opremcak and Bruce74	BRVO where VA ↓ secondary to macular haemorrhage and oedema + ischaemia	Prospective non‐randomised	15 patients, 5 months follow up (range 1–12 months)		Initial VA ⩽ 20/70, Snellen VA equal or better in 12 of 15 patients (80%),10/15 patients (67%) had improved postoperative VA with average of 4 lines vision gained (range 1–9 lines). 3 patients had worse VA with average 2 lines vision lost. 2 patients had surgical success and resolution of retinal haemorrhage and oedema but no VA improvement		Retinal vascular bleeding in 2 patients, needed needle diathermy (these patients had different anatomical configuration, venule underlying bifurcation of arteriole)Can cause NFL defect bleeding. Retinal detachment. Retinal tear, duration of visual symptoms 1–12 months (average 3.3 months)
Shah et al77	BRVO with macular oedema	Case reports	5 patients 6.5 years follow up(range 5–7 years)		Initial VA < 20/200. In 4 out of 5 eyes (80%) VA improved to 20/30–20/70 in 1 eye, VA remained CF secondary to macular ischaemia		Cataract. Vitreous haemorrhage in 2/3 patients, BRVO duration 3–4 weeks
Le Rouic et al80	BRVO: recent onset	Prospective	3 patients, 1 year follow up		Initial VA:20/80 after 11/12 20/80 secondary to ischaemia had laser20/80 after 10/12 20/200 secondary ischaemia had laser20/200 after 9/12 20/200 had persistent macular oedemaNo benefit
Mester and Dillinger75	BRVO	Control v case non‐randomised	43 patients, 23 controls 6 weeks follow up		VA ⩽ 20/50 and macular haemorrhages + oedema or ischaemia. Mean VA ↑ from 0.16 (±0.12) to 0.35 (±0.25) following surgery26 patients (60%) gained at least 2 lines of VA and 12 patients (28%) gained 4 + lines VA. Only 1 patient lost 2 lines VA. All patients with improvement of 4+ lines had incomplete vein occlusion on FFA. 4 eyes with complete occlusion had worst results functionally. Macular oedema + intraretinal haemorrhage resorbed in all patients.Control group:VA ↓ from 0.23 (±0.12) to 022 (±0.16) over 6 weeks5 eyes (20%) gained 2 + lines VA9 patients (36%) lost 2 + linesOperated patients had slightly better functional outcome		Nil, All patients had isovoluaemic haemodilution for 10 days. Occluded vein decompressed in all cases but complete capillary reperfusion seen in only in 4 eyesLongest preop duration of BRVO was 3/12
Cahill et al79	BRVO	Retrospective	27 patients		29.6% had resolution of CMO and significant increase in VA. There was no improvement in VA in 2/3 eyes
Intravitreal triamcinolone
Jonas et al26	BRVO	Prospective comparative, non‐randomised	10 patients, 18 controls, 8 months follow up		Mean VA increased significantly in the treated group. 90% of eyes gained VA and 60% had an increase in VA of at least 2 lines		VA increased significantly only in the non‐ischaemic subgroup
Isovolaemic haemodilution
Chen et al43	BRVO	Randomised controlled trial	18 patients, 16 controls, 1 year follow up		Final VA was better in the treated group. Final VA was 6/12 in treated and 6/24 in controls