Large scale research investigating treatable traits (TTs) in asthma and/or COPD has significantly advanced understanding of their utility in the personalised management of chronic respiratory diseases, with a surprising finding or two in the mix.
Researchers sought to assess the prevalence of treatable traits (TTs) and their relationship to diagnosis and disease severity as established by a physician in clinical practice, amid the growing prominence of TTs as a disease management strategy around the globe.
The researchers selected 30 frequently occurring TTs observed in the global NOVELTY study for patients diagnosed with asthma (n=5,932, 52.8%), COPD (n=3,898, 34.7%) or both (n=1,396, 12.4%), in primary care or specialised centres.
Key findings included that the prevalence of these “varied widely” within the NOVELTY cohort, and that patients had an average of five TTs.
There were no large variations due to sex, age or geography, but there were significant differences between clinical care settings (primary versus specialised clinics) and disease severity, according to the paper, published in Respirology.
The data showed that six (pulmonary) TTs were “significantly associated” with an ‘asthma’ (allergic and non-allergic rhinosinusitis, nasal sinus polyps and several allergies) or ‘COPD’ (non-reversible airflow limitation and emphysema diagnoses).
However, surprisingly, and importantly for clinical practice, “the prevalence of 18 pulmonary, extra-pulmonary and/or behavioural/environmental TTs was similar, irrespective of the diagnostic label used, including some TTs traditionally considered almost exclusive to ‘asthma’ or ‘COPD’, such as bronchodilator reversibility, Th2 and frequent productive cough,” the authors noted.