Abstract
Interstitial lung disease (ILD) secondary to drug-induced lung injury is an increasingly common cause of morbidity and mortality. The number of drugs associated with the development of ILD continues to raise, mainly due to the use of novel monoclonal antibodies and biologics for neoplastic and rheumatologic diseases, and includes, among others, chemotherapeutics, molecular targeting agents, immune checkpoint inhibitors, antibiotics, antiarrhythmics, and conventional or biologic disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs. Drug-induced ILD (DI-ILD) manifests with a variety of clinical patterns, ranging from mild respiratory symptoms to rapidly progressive respiratory failure and death. In most cases, there are no pathognomonic clinical, laboratory, radiological or pathological features and the diagnosis of DI-ILD is suspected in the presence of exposure to a drug known to cause lung toxicity and after exclusion of alternative causes of ILD. Early identification and permanent discontinuation of the culprit drug are the cornerstones of treatment with systemic glucocorticoids being used in patients with disabling or progressive disease. However, for certain drugs, such as checkpoint inhibitors, the frequency of lung toxicity is such that mitigation strategies are put in place to prevent this complication and occurrence of DI-ILD is not necessarily synonymous with permanent drug discontinuation, particularly in the absence of valid therapeutic alternatives.
Footnotes
This manuscript has recently been accepted for publication in the European Respiratory Journal. It is published here in its accepted form prior to copyediting and typesetting by our production team. After these production processes are complete and the authors have approved the resulting proofs, the article will move to the latest issue of the ERJ online. Please open or download the PDF to view this article.
Conflict of Interest Disclosures: PB reports research grant (paid to his institution) from Astra Zeneca, personal fees for participation to advisory board meetings from Roche, Boehringer-Ingelheim, Astra Zeneca and Novartis, and support for attending medical/research meetings from Roche, Boehringer-Ingelheim, Astra Zeneca, Novartis, Chiesi, Sanofi and Stallergenes. PS, GR, NS and VC have nothing to disclose.
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- Received October 22, 2021.
- Accepted March 14, 2022.
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