Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) remains a major public health problem. It is the fourth leading cause of chronic morbidity and mortality in the United States, and is projected to rank fifth in 2020 in burden of disease worldwide, according to a study published by the World Bank/World Health Organization. Yet, COPD remains relatively unknown or ignored by the public as well as public health and government officials. In 1998, in an effort to bring more attention to COPD, its management, and its prevention, a committed group of scientists encouraged the U.S. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute and the World Health Organization to form the Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD). Among the important objectives of GOLD are to increase awareness of COPD and to help the millions of people who suffer from this disease and die prematurely of it or its complications. The first step in the GOLD program was to prepare a consensus report, Global Strategy for the Diagnosis, Management, and Prevention of COPD, published in 2001. The present, newly revised document follows the same format as the original consensus report, but has been updated to reflect the many publications on COPD that have appeared. GOLD national leaders, a network of international experts, have initiated investigations of the causes and prevalence of COPD in their countries, and developed innovative approaches for the dissemination and implementation of COPD management guidelines. We appreciate the enormous amount of work the GOLD national leaders have done on behalf of their patients with COPD. Despite the achievements in the 5 years since the GOLD report was originally published, considerable additional work is ahead of us if we are to control this major public health problem. The GOLD initiative will continue to bring COPD to the attention of governments, public health officials, health care workers, and the general public, but a concerted effort by all involved in health care will be necessary.

https://www.who.int/respiratory/copd/GOLD_WR_06.pdf

Global strategy for the diagnosis, management, and prevention of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: GOLD executive summary.

Global strategy for the diagnosis, management, and prevention of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. NHLBI/WHO Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD) Workshop summary.

Representatives from many countries serve as a network for the dissemination and implementation of programs for diagnosis, management, and prevention of COPD. The GOLD Board of Directors is grateful to the many GOLD National Leaders who participated in discussions of concepts that appear in GOLD reports.

Global initiative for chronic obstructive lung disease.

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is a leading cause of death and disability, but has only recently been extensively explored from a cellular and molecular perspective. There is a chronic inflammation that leads to fixed narrowing of small airways and alveolar wall destruction (emphysema). This is characterised by increased numbers of alveolar macrophages, neutrophils and cytotoxic T-lymphocytes, and the release of multiple inflammatory mediators (lipids, chemokines, cytokines, growth factors). A high level of oxidative stress may amplify this inflammation. There is also increased elastolysis and evidence for involvement of several elastolytic enzymes, including serine proteases, cathepsins and matrix metalloproteinases. The inflammation and proteolysis in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is an amplification of the normal inflammatory response to cigarette smoke. This inflammation, in marked contrast to asthma, appears to be resistant to corticosteroids, prompting a search for novel anti-inflammatory therapies that may prevent the relentless progression of the disease.

https://erj.ersjournals.com/content/erj/22/4/672.full.pdf

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: molecular and cellular mechanisms.

https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lancet/PIIS0140-6736(04)16900-6.pdf

Pathophysiology of airflow limitation in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

To examine the relation between small-airways abnormalities and specific lung functions, we performed pulmonary-function tests in 36 patients, of whom two were nonsmokers, one to three days before open-lung biopsy for localized pulmonary lesions. The primary lesion in the small airways was a progressive inflammatory reaction leading to fibrosis with connective-tissue deposition in the airway walls. Increase in disease in small airways correlated with deterioration in lung function. Lesions could be reliably detected (P<0.05) by tests for closing capacity, the volume at which air and helium flow were equal (a test of airway caliber and elastic recoil), and the slope of phase III of the single-breath washout curve (which tests evenness of ventilation). These tests showed abnormalities at a time when the pathologic changes were still potentially reversible and when other tests were not appreciably changed. (N Engl J Med 298:1277–1281, 1977)

M. Loveland

Papers

The relations between structural changes in small airways and pulmonary-function tests.