A comprehensive analysis of association of medical history with airflow limitation: a cross-sectional study

Yayoi Nishida,1 Yasuo Takahashi,1 Kotoe Tezuka,1 Keiko Yamazaki,1 Yoichi Yada,2 Tomohiro Nakayama,3,4 Satoshi Asai2 1Division of Genomic Epidemiology and Clinical Trials, Clinical Trials Research Center, 2Division of Pharmacology, Department of Biomedical Sciences, 3Division of Companion Diagnostics, 4Division of Laboratory Medicine, Department of Pathology and Microbiology, Nihon University School of Medicine, Itabashi-ku, Tokyo, Japan Background: Multiple comorbidity is common and increases the complexity of the presentation of patients with COPD. This study was a comprehensive analysis of the relationship between a medical history of 22 disease categories and the presence of airflow limitation (AL) without any history of asthma or bronchiectasis, compatible with COPD. Methods: A total of 11,898 Japanese patients aged ≥40 years, who underwent spirometry tests, comprising patients with AL (n=2,309) or without AL (n=9,589), were evaluated. Generalized estimating equations were used to assess the relationship between the presence of AL and each disease. The model was adjusted for age, sex, body mass index (BMI) and pack-years of smoking. Results: In multivariate analysis, female sex (odds ratio [OR]: 0.59; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.52–0.67), age (OR for 10-year age increase: 1.99; CI: 1.90–2.09), BMI (OR for 1 kg/m2 increase: 0.96; CI: 0.95–0.98) and smoking history (