PT - JOURNAL ARTICLE AU - Yoshiyuki Oyama AU - Tomoyuki Fujisawa AU - Dai Hashimoto AU - Noriyuki Enomoto AU - Yutaro Nakamura AU - Naoki Inui AU - Shigeki Kuroishi AU - Koshi Yokomura AU - Mikio Toyoshima AU - Takashi Yamada AU - Toshihiro Shirai AU - Masafumi Masuda AU - Kazumasa Yasuda AU - Hiroshi Hayakawa AU - Kingo Chida AU - Takafumi Suda TI - Efficacy of short-term prednisolone treatment in patients with chronic eosinophilic pneumonia AID - 10.1183/09031936.00199614 DP - 2015 Jun 01 TA - European Respiratory Journal PG - 1624--1631 VI - 45 IP - 6 4099 - http://erj.ersjournals.com/content/45/6/1624.short 4100 - http://erj.ersjournals.com/content/45/6/1624.full SO - Eur Respir J2015 Jun 01; 45 AB - In patients with chronic eosinophilic pneumonia (CEP), dramatic improvements are seen in response to corticosteroid therapy; however, relapse is common after treatment has ceased. The optimal duration of corticosteroid therapy remains unclear. In a randomised, open-label, parallel group study, eligible patients with CEP received oral prednisolone for either 3 months (3-month group) or 6 months (6-month group), followed by 2 years observation. All patients were treated with an initial dose of prednisolone of 0.5 mg·kg−1·day−1, which was then tapered and discontinued at either 3 or 6 months. The primary end-point was relapse during the follow-up period. In the final analysis, there were 23 patients in the 3-month group and 21 patients in the 6-month group. All patients showed a good response to prednisolone treatment. There were 12 (52.1%) relapses in the 3-month group and 13 (61.9%) relapses in the 6-month group. No significant difference was found in the cumulative rate of relapse (p=0.56). All relapse cases showed improvement upon resumption of prednisolone treatment. No difference was observed in the rate of relapse between the 3- and 6-month prednisolone treatment groups for patients with CEP. Short-term, 3 month, prednisolone treatment is a therapeutic option for chronic eosinophilic pneumonia http://ow.ly/FN1p2