Synexus, the world's largest multinational company dedicated to the successful recruitment and running of clinical studies, is currently recruiting patients in the Midlands to assess a treatment that could help manage one of the UK’s most common respiratory diseases - Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD).
Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is the name for a collection of lung diseases including chronic bronchitis, emphysema and chronic obstructive airways disease.People with COPD have difficulties breathing, primarily due to the narrowing of their airways, this is called airflow obstruction. The breathing difficulties and tiredness due to COPD can affect all aspects of people’s lives including work, travel and hobbies.
The main cause of COPD is smoking and the likelihood of developing COPD increases the more you smoke and the longer you've been smoking. COPD usually affects people over the age of 35 and it is thought there are over 3 million people living with the disease in the UK, of which only about 900,000 have been diagnosed. This is because many people who develop symptoms of COPD do not get medical help because they often dismiss their symptoms as a ‘smoker’s cough’.
Current treatments for COPD can help reduce symptoms, but some people still have an exacerbation or a breathlessness attack when lungs become inflamed due to infections or air pollution.
The treatment that Synexus is assessing in the clinical study may help improve COPD symptoms, allow easier breathing and improve cough and phlegm symptoms in people with moderate and severe COPD.
