Abstract
Understanding the natural history of a disease is as important as knowing its cause(s) for effective disease prevention and treatment. Yet, our current understanding of the natural history of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is incomplete and often controversial. This article discusses the current gaps, and hence opportunities for research, in this field. In particular, it discusses the following six specific questions. 1) Is COPD a “single” disease? 2) Is COPD “only” a lung disease? 3) When does COPD begin or what is “early” COPD? 4) How does COPD “progress”? 5) How do we assess disease “severity”? 6) Can COPD be prevented (beyond smoking cessation) or its course be modified once detected?
Abstract
A new review series starts in ERJ Open Research: “Gaps in our understanding of COPD” http://ow.ly/CFSD30gpXs8
Footnotes
Number 1 in the series “Gaps in our understanding of COPD” Edited by A. Agustí and B. Celli
Conflict of interest: Disclosures can be found alongside this article at openres.ersjournals.com. Both authors are members of the Board of Directors of the Global Initiative for Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD), but the opinions and proposals presented in this manuscript are their own and not necessarily those of GOLD.
- Received September 21, 2017.
- Accepted October 13, 2017.
- Copyright ©ERS 2017
This article is open access and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Licence 4.0.