Sex and gender in lung health and disease: more than just Xs and Ys

A new series explores the role of sex and gender-related factors in respiratory physiology, lung health, and across respiratory diseases https://bit.ly/3mP0BV

“None of us are lying”: an interpretive description of the search for legitimacy and the journey to access quality health services by individuals living with Long COVID

Abstract Background Understanding of Long COVID has advanced through patient-led initiatives. However, research about barriers to accessing Long COVID services is limited. This study aimed to better understand the need for, access to, and quality of, Long COVID services. We explored health needs and experiences of services, including ability of services to address needs. Methods Our study was informed by the Levesque et al.’s (2013) “conceptual framework of access to health care.” We used Interpretive Description, a qualitative approach partly aimed at informing clinical decisions. We recruited participants across five settings. Participants engaged in one-time, semi-structured, virtual interviews. Interviews were transcribed verbatim. We used reflexive thematic analysis. Best practice to ensure methodological rigour was employed. Results Three key themes were generated from 56 interviews. The first theme illustrated the rollercoaster-like nature of participants’ Long COVID symptoms and the resulting impact on function and health. The second theme highlighted participants’ attempts to access Long COVID services. Guidance received from healthcare professionals and self-advocacy impacted initial access. When navigating Long COVID services within the broader system, participants encountered barriers to access around stigma; appointment logistics; testing and ‘normal’ results; and financial precarity and affordability of services. The third theme illuminated common factors participants liked and disliked about Long COVID services. We framed each sub-theme as the key lesson (stemming from all likes and dislikes) that, if acted upon, the health system can use to improve the quality of Long COVID services. This provides tangible ways to improve the system based directly on what we heard from participants. Conclusion With Long COVID services continuously evolving, our findings can inform decision makers within the health system to better understand the lived experiences of Long COVID and tailor services and policies appropriately

Pulmonary Vascular Disease and Cardiopulmonary Exercise Testing

International audienceCardiopulmonary exercise testing (CPET) is of great interest and utility for clinicians dealing Pulmonary Hypertension (PH) in several ways, including: helping with differential diagnosis, evaluating exercise intolerance and its underpinning mechanisms, accurately assessing exertional dyspnea and unmasking its underlying often non-straightforward mechanisms, generating prognostic indicators. Pathophysiologic anomalies in PH can range from reduced cardiac output and aerobic capacity, to inefficient ventilation, dyspnea, dynamic hyperinflation, and locomotor muscle dysfunction. CPET can magnify the PH-related pathophysiologic anomalies and has a major role in the management of PH patients

Heritable pulmonary hypertension: from bench to bedside

Mutations in the BMPR2 gene, and more rarely in ACVRL1, endoglin, caveolin-1, KCNK3 and TBX4 genes predispose to heritable pulmonary arterial hypertension, an autosomal dominant disease with incomplete penetrance. Bi-allelic mutations in the EIF2AK4 gene predispose to heritable pulmonary veno-occlusive disease/pulmonary capillary haemangiomatosis, an autosomal recessive disease with an unknown penetrance. In France, the national pulmonary hypertension referral centre offers genetic counselling and testing to adults and children. Predictive testing is also proposed to adult relatives at risk of carrying a predisposing mutation. In that context, we offer all asymptomatic BMPR2 mutation carriers a programme to detect pulmonary arterial hypertension at an early phase, as recommended by the 2015 European Society Society of Cardiology/European Respiratory Society pulmonary hypertension guidelines. Finally, pre-implantation genetic diagnosis has been conducted on five embryos from two couples in which the fathers were carriers of a pathogenic BMPR2 mutation

Ventilatory response to exercise in cardiopulmonary disease: the role of chemosensitivity and dead space

International audienceThe lungs and heart are irrevocably linked in their oxygen (O 2 ) and carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) transport functions. Functional impairment of the lungs often affects heart function and vice versa . The steepness with which ventilation ( V ′ E ) rises with respect to CO 2 production ( V ′ CO 2 ) ( i.e. the V ′ E / V ′ CO 2 slope) is a measure of ventilatory efficiency and can be used to identify an abnormal ventilatory response to exercise. The V ′ E / V ′ CO 2 slope is a prognostic marker in several chronic cardiopulmonary diseases independent of other exercise-related variables such as peak O 2 uptake ( V ′ O 2 ). The V ′ E / V ′ CO 2 slope is determined by two factors: 1) the arterial CO 2 partial pressure ( P aCO 2 ) during exercise and 2) the fraction of the tidal volume ( V T ) that goes to dead space ( V D ) ( i.e. the physiological dead space ratio ( V D / V T )). An altered P aCO 2 set-point and chemosensitivity are present in many cardiopulmonary diseases, which influence V ′ E / V ′ CO 2 by affecting P aCO 2 . Increased ventilation–perfusion heterogeneity, causing inefficient gas exchange, also contributes to the abnormal V ′ E / V ′ CO 2 observed in cardiopulmonary diseases by increasing V D / V T . During cardiopulmonary exercise testing, the P aCO 2 during exercise is often not measured and V D / V T is only estimated by taking into account the end-tidal CO 2 partial pressure ( P ETCO 2 ); however, P aCO 2 is not accurately estimated from P ETCO 2 in patients with cardiopulmonary disease. Measuring arterial gases ( P aO 2 and P aCO 2 ) before and during exercise provides information on the real (and not “estimated”) V D / V T coupled with a true measure of gas exchange efficiency such as the difference between alveolar and arterial O 2 partial pressure and the difference between arterial and end-tidal CO 2 partial pressure during exercise

Bronchoscopic Resection of a Central Typical Carcinoid Tumour

Peer Reviewe