What’s trending in Breathlessness research? Proceedings from the 8th Annual Meeting of the Breathlessness Research Interest Group

Journal article

Breathlessness remains a challenging symptom, common to a multitude of malignant and non-malignant diseases, for which there are limited effective therapies once disease control is optimised. The American Thoracic Society statement on dyspnoea reports that:

i) Progress in dyspnoea management has not matched progress in elucidating underlying mechanisms;

ii) There is a critical need for interdisciplinary translational research to connect dyspnoea mechanisms with treatments;

iii) There is a need to validate dyspnoea measures as patient-reported outcomes for clinical trials.

There are challenges to researching breathlessness but consensus exists regarding a rational approach to designing adequately powered interventional studies to allow comparison between these in the future. As such, research into the many dimensions of breathlessness and its significance to patients and their carers has increased over the years. This meeting is convened yearly to bring together researchers across various disciplines including respiratory physicians, anaesthetics, medical humanities, engineering and palliative care, to further understanding of the symptom, discuss new techniques and advances in research, and pave the way forward for future studies and interventions.

Authors: Chin, C; Butcher, H; Spathis, A; Ryan, R; Johnson, M

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Wiley
• Journal: Progress in Palliative Care
• Volume: 23
• Issue: 6
• Pages: 326-330
• Publication date: 2015-04-27
• DOI: 10.1179/1743291X15Y.0000000005
• EISSN: 1743-291X
• ISSN: 0969-9260