English

Abstract

BACKGROUND Active smoking is responsible for nearly 70 % of the cases of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in developed countries and is much lesser in the developing nations. Though the remaining are attributed to environmental tobacco exposures, occupational factors and genetic factors, there are not enough studies demonstrating the causation. This study is to identify the clinical features of neversmoker patients with COPD and the prevalence of environmental exposures in COPD patients. METHODS An observational cross-sectional study was conducted from Nov. 2018 to Jan. 2019. All patients above 18 years with respiratory symptoms and satisfying the following diagnostic criteria for COPD were included. All patients included in the study must be never-smokers. Control group of 20 healthy individuals were included. A detailed demographic profile and medical history was obtained from all participants. Pulmonary function assessment was done for all. Chi-square test was used for analysing data. RESULTS Cough was the most common symptom (88.2 %) in these patients. Dyspnoea was present in 21 patients (41.17 %). In the study participants, 36 were exposed to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) or passive smoking. Out of them 29 patients (80.5 %) were exposed to passive smoking at home, 15 patients (41.7 %) were exposed to passive smoking at work and 8 patients (22.2 %) at both places. The number of patients who practiced firewood cooking was 31 (40.8 %). The relationship seen between the test and control group was found to be statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS COPD in never smokers is more common in females compared to males. Cough is the most common symptom in this subset of patients with COPD. There is a high rate of exposure to environmental tobacco smoke and firewood smoke in neversmokers who develop COPD. KEYWORDS COPD, Adult Never Smokers, Environmental Exposures, Passive Smoking