Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD)
Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a serious category of lung disease characterized by airflow obstruction and can lead to a prolonged time to blow out the air from the lungs.
People with COPD can have different forms of this obstructive lung disease.
- In one type of COPD, emphysema, mainly the air sacs of the lungs are damaged and the patient primarily complains of shortness of breath.
- A second form of COPD, chronic bronchitis, is a disorder of the large airways of the lungs and the patient often presents with cough and sputum production as their primary symptoms.
Patients may have signs and symptoms consistent with one form of the disease or a combination of features.
The UPMC Comprehensive Lung Center, which offers both diagnosis and second opinion consultations for people with COPD, is the clinical home to the Emphysema/COPD Research Center. While there is no cure for COPD, doctors at this center at UPMC are experts at managing the disease and providing treatments that can ease the symptoms.
About the Emphysema/COPD Research Center
The Emphysema/COPD Research Center is a nationally recognized center conducting critical studies to understand why:
- people with COPD develop different forms of the disease
- some smokers never develop COPD
This groundbreaking research should lead to important knowledge that might allow prevention of the disease in the future.
For those patients with COPD, these investigators are also attempting to find the pathways that lead to different forms of the disease, and treatments to stop progression of the disease once it occurs.
Return to the UPMC Comprehensive Lung Center homepage.