World Trade Center Health Program best practices for diagnosing and treating chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

Abstract

World Trade Center exposures may have the potential to cause or aggravate chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). The WTC Health Program covers the entire range of clinical services for COPD, following the 2021 diagnostic and treatment guidelines of the Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD).

Keywords:

• Chronic bronchitis
• chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
• occupational lung disease
• smoke inhalation injury
• World Trade Center Attack
• 2001

Acknowledgments

The authors acknowledge the comments from the clinicians of the WTC HP Clinical Centers. This review did not involve human subjects research, and was thus exempt from institutional review board review.

Disclosure statement

This work was funded in part by grant U01 OH011697 (RED, PI) from the Centers for Disease Control/National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (CDC/NIOSH). The authors have no other relevant financial conflict of interest. The contents of this article are the sole responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement by, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (CDC/HHS), or the U.S. Government

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Funding

The author(s) reported there is no other funding associated with the work featured in this article.