Association of Antibiotic Use and New-Onset ICD Coding of Geographic Atrophy.

Exposure to antibiotics is associated with increased odds of new-onset International Classification of Diseases coding of geographic atrophy. This association may be dose dependent.

These findings suggest that antibiotic exposure could be a novel modifiable risk factor for geographic atrophy, although this conclusion is tempered by potential confounding by health status or misclassification of geographic atrophy and by multiple comparisons.

Further investigation will be needed to validate these findings.