Type 2 Inflammation in COPD: is It Just Asthma?

Overview

Journal Breathe (Sheff)

Specialty Pulmonary Medicine

Date 2024 Nov 13

PMID 39534492

Authors

Augusta Beech

Andrew Higham

Sophie Booth

Vickram Tejwani

Frederik Trinkmann

Dave Singh

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

COPD is a heterogeneous condition, with tobacco smoking being the main environmental risk factor. The presence of type 2 (T2) inflammation is a well-recognised feature of asthma; however, it is now apparent that a subset of COPD patients also displays evidence of T2 inflammation with respect to elevated eosinophil counts and altered gene and protein expression of several T2 inflammatory mediators. T2 inflammatory mediators represent an attractive therapeutic target in both COPD and asthma; however, the efficacy of pharmaceutical interventions varies between diseases. Furthermore, the nature of some shared clinical features also differs. We provide a narrative review of differences in the nature of T2 inflammation between COPD and asthma, which may partly explain phenotypic differences between diseases. We focus on evidence from studies of pulmonary histopathology, sputum and epithelial gene and protein expression, and response to pharmacological interventions targeted at T2 inflammation.

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