TY - JOUR T1 - Mars and Venus in the GP's office JF - European Respiratory Journal JO - Eur Respir J SP - 259 LP - 261 DO - 10.1183/09031936.06.00075306 VL - 28 IS - 2 AU - C. Jenkins Y1 - 2006/08/01 UR - http://erj.ersjournals.com/content/28/2/259.abstract N2 - Discussions about the differences between men and women are age-old, but usually of great interest to both sexes and, despite our increasing understanding of gender psychology, likely to be prone to bias and misconstruction for centuries to come. The mix of gender differences in the pathogenesis, perception and presentation of disease is a potent brew for confusion, but needs further research if we are to completely understand the variety of ways in which nature and nurture interact in the development and manifestations of obstructive lung disease. For some time, it has been known that men and women perceive and relate their symptoms differently 1. For many diseases, it is also becoming clear that males and females develop different symptoms and clinical manifestations, at different stages of a disease, and respond differently to treatment 2, 3. Traditionally, women have been considered to be more likely to report symptoms and to be more sensitive to changes in underlying disease 4, 5. In relation to the presenting features of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in males and females, two papers published in the present issue of the European Respiratory Journal have some important contributions to make. In the first of these papers, Watson et al. 6 investigated predictors for the presence, development and remission of COPD symptoms in participants completing 3 yrs of the European Respiratory Society Study on Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (EUROSCOP). Over these 3 yrs similar proportions of males and females reported symptoms, although in males better lung function was associated with a reduction in new symptoms of wheeze and dyspnoea, and symptom prevalence reduced with annual improvement of forced expiratory volume in one second (FEV1). The prevalence of phlegm was reduced with budesonide treatment, an effect seen only in males. An increase in … ER -