Abstract
Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a progressive disease and its mortality has rapidly increased. Early diagnosis and early management of COPD is very important for the reduction of mortality. The prevalence of COPD in Japan is reported to be 8.6%, but most of the patients were not diagnosed. Among undiagnosed COPD patients, more than half patients go to clinics with other diseases. Among the patients who are 40 or older and go to clinics with non-respiratory diseases, the prevalence of COPD is 10.3%. When diagnosed with post-bronchodilator condition, the prevalence was 8.7%. Patients with liver diseases were significantly higher prevalence of COPD than the patients with other diseases. As liver disease might be one of the risk factors of COPD, patients with liver diseases should be encouraged to perform spirometry for early detection of COPD. As early diagnosis and early management of COPD is very important, more aggressive intension to diagnosis of COPD in primary care doctors is desired.
