Pulmonary medicine: asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis

Important changes have been proposed by expert groups for the management of mild asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD): for safety reasons, short-acting beta-2 agonists (SABA) are no longer recommended as « reliever therapy » in mild asthma, and should be replaced by symptom-driven inhaled corticosteroids, alone or combined with a beta-2 agonist ; for COPD patients recommendations as to use of inhaled corticosteroids have been redefined. New therapeutic options for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis are being evaluated: recombinant human pentraxin 2 may become a new therapeutic option among the existing specific treatments (pirfenidone, nintedanib). These novelties are discussed in this review of the recent medical literature.