Active clinical trials for "Pulmonary Disease, Chronic Obstructive"

An investigational inhalation product (QVA149) for the treatment of patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is being developed. This 14 day study will investigate the effect on heart rate and cardiovascular effects to ensure the product is safe.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of the practice of singing for a long period of time on pulmonary function data, quality of life, and dyspnea sensation of patients with COPD in stable clinical conditions. As singing is a type of respiratory training, the study hypothesis is that singing would improve maximal respiratory pressures, dyspnea sensation, and overall quality of life of these patients.

Short course of steroids in COPD exacerbation improves FEV1 and decreases the relapse rate. However, some concerns remain about using systemic steroids for all patients with acute exacerbation. Their short-term advantages may be outweighed by the occurrence of adverse side effects such as hyperglycemia, which is difficult to manage on an outpatient basis. In this context, the possibility of treating patients with COPD exacerbation with inhaled steroids having less systemic adverse effects is interesting. The objectives are to compare relapse rate, lung function, the severity of dyspnea and, systemic and sputum inflammatory markers in outpatients with acute COPD exacerbations treated with fluticasone/salmeterol (Advair®) or oral prednisone for 10 days. The hypothesis is that Advair® is as effective as prednisone in treatment of outpatients with COPD exacerbation. The primary endpoint is to determine if the relapse rate at one month is equivalent for both treatments. The secondary endpoints are to compare lung function and dyspnea score and, systemic and sputum inflammatory markers modulation after 10 days of both treatments. We will recruit 30 outpatients in each group from our COPD clinic. Patients will receive prednisone (40mg/day) with placebo diskus or Advair® 50/500ug 2 inhalations bid (twice the regular dose) with placebo pills for 10 days. All patients will receive antibiotics and short-acting bronchodilators as needed. We expect to demonstrate that the improvement of lung function, dyspnea, inflammatory markers and relapse rate are equivalent in both treatments suggesting that Advair® could be a good alternative to prednisone for patients with steroid-induced hyperglycemia.

The purpose of this study it to evaluate the efficacy and safety of the 20 mL BLVR System in patients with advanced upper lobe predominant emphysema.

Aims of the study to evaluate the rate of enteric gram negative bacteria colonization in tracheotomised COPD patients to evaluate the effect of azithromycin long-term treatment on Pseudomonas aeruginosa colonization and colony counts, and on reduction of the number of exacerbations/hospitalisations, antibiotic courses and steroid use. to evaluate the Quality of Life of patients treated and not treated with azithromycin, using a validate Italian version of St George questionnaire to evaluate the rate of chronic colonization with atypical pathogens to evaluate the safety and tolerability of a long-term treatment with azithromycin, including a survey on possible bacterial antibiotic resistance pattern variations

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the safety and effectiveness of fish oil supplements in maintaining weight in people with disease-related weight loss and/or cachexia.

A parallell group study comparing the effect of an education program with an education and training program for patients with COPD. 30 participants in each group. Participants self-select which group they wanted to be in. Main outcome is SGRQ (a HQoL for patients with COPD).

The role of antibiotic therapy in patients with COPD remains controversial. While the outcome of several clinical trials is in favour of antibiotics, the quality of these studies in insufficient. In this study the efficacy of doxycycline is compared to placebo. All concommitant treatment (steroids, bronchodilator therapy, physiotherapy) is standardized. The investigators hypothesize that patients with an acute exacerbations will have a better outcome when treated with antibiotics.

The purpose of this study is to look at the benefits of tiotropium, an approved drug for the treatment of bronchospasm associated with COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), in a population of patients with COPD who are of African American descent.

Tele-home health care, which providers for video interactions between home-based veterans and home care nurses, is a potentially useful adjunct to home care services. However, few randomized trials have been conducted of this technology.