MONDAY, April 3 (HealthDay News) -- Patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) have less inflammation and improved lung function after treatment with a combination of the beta2-agonist salmeterol and the corticosteroid fluticasone propionate, according to a study in the April 1 issue of the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.
Neil Barnes, M.D., of London Chest Hospital in the U.K., and colleagues randomly assigned 140 current and former smokers with COPD to receive salmeterol/fluticasone propionate or a placebo for 13 weeks. Sputa were taken at baseline and repeated at eight and 13 weeks, while biopsies were repeated at 12 weeks.
Patients receiving salmeterol/fluticasone propionate had a 36 percent reduction in biopsy CD8+ cells compared with placebo. Sputum differential neutrophils and total eosinophils were also significantly reduced. In patients receiving the drugs, the study found significantly fewer biopsy CD45+ and CD4+ cells, as well as significantly fewer cells producing tumor necrosis factor-alpha and interferon-gamma. Lung function also improved, as observed by an improvement in prebronchodilator forced expiratory volume in one second of 173 mL.
"The combination of salmeterol and fluticasone propionate has a broad spectrum of anti-inflammatory effects in both current and former smokers with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, which may contribute to clinical efficacy," the authors write.
The study was supported by GlaxoSmithKline Research and Development Ltd, which markets treatments.
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