The influence of non-invasive lung ventilation on functional and immune characteristics in patients with severe exacerbation of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

Abstract

We studied the influence of spontaneous/timed non-invasive ventilation (NIV) on the functional and immune characteristics of patients with severe exacerbation of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Symptoms, pulmonary function test, O2 saturation (SpO2) were investigated; serum content of soluble differentiated leukocyte molecules was measured using ELISA. NIV led to a more significant improvement of general state, dyspnea, and respiratory function in comparison with the control group, increased SpO2, and decreased initially elevated concentrations of soluble sCD95, sCD50, sCD16 molecules reflecting the reduction of inflammatory activation of immune cells. The use of NIV allowed to lower the doses of systemic corticosteroids that caused inhibition of 6 out of 13 studied soluble antigens in the control group (oligomeric and total sCD95, total sCD38, sCD25, sCD50, sHLA-DR) due to non-selective immunosuppressive action. This procedure may be recommended for a wider use in pulmonological practice.