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ABSTRACT: Background
The burden of symptoms varies markedly between patients with COPD and is only weakly correlated with lung function impairment. While heterogeneity in lung function decline and exacerbations have been previously studied, the extent of heterogeneity in symptoms and the factors associated with this heterogeneity are not well understood.Methods
A sample of the general Canadian population ?40 years with persistent airflow limitation was followed for up to 3 years. Participants reported whether they experienced chronic coughing, phlegm, wheezing, or dyspnea during visits at 18-month intervals. We used mixed-effect logistic regression models (separately for each symptom) to assess overall heterogeneity in the occurrence of symptoms between individuals, and the proportion of variation in symptom burden explained by lung function vs all other clinical characteristics of participants.Results
Four hundred forty-nine participants (53% male, mean age 67 years) contributed 968 visits in total, and 89% of patients reported at least one symptom during follow-up. There was substantial heterogeneity in the individual-specific probabilities for the occurrence of symptoms. This heterogeneity was highest for wheeze and dyspnea (IQR of probabilities: 0.13-0.78 and 0.19-0.81, respectively). FEV1 explained 28% of the variation between individuals in the occurrence of dyspnea, 8% for phlegm, 3% for cough, and 2% for wheeze. All clinical characteristics of participants (including FEV1) explained between 26% of heterogeneity in the occurrence of cough to 49% for dyspnea.Conclusion
There is marked heterogeneity in the burden of respiratory symptoms between COPD patients. The ability of lung function and other commonly measured clinical characteristics to explain this heterogeneity differs between symptoms.
SUBMITTER: Johnson KM
PROVIDER: S-EPMC6296193 | biostudies-literature | 2018
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Johnson Kate M KM Safari Abdollah A Tan Wan C WC Bourbeau Jean J FitzGerald J Mark JM Sadatsafavi Mohsen M Study On Behalf Of The Canadian Cohort Of Obstructive Lung Disease CanCOLD OBOTCCOOLDC
International journal of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease 20181213
<h4>Background</h4>The burden of symptoms varies markedly between patients with COPD and is only weakly correlated with lung function impairment. While heterogeneity in lung function decline and exacerbations have been previously studied, the extent of heterogeneity in symptoms and the factors associated with this heterogeneity are not well understood.<h4>Methods</h4>A sample of the general Canadian population ≥40 years with persistent airflow limitation was followed for up to 3 years. Participa ...[more]