Clinical, functional and biological characteristics of subjects with and without sputum eosinophilia before and after treatment with inhaled corticosteroids
| Eosinophils <1% | Eosinophils >1% | |||||
| Baseline | Post ICS | Change | Baseline | Post ICS | Change | |
| Symptom score | 12.9±6.1 | 4.28±8.0* | −8.6 (−12.7–−4.4) | 9.53±5.8 | 1.8±3.2* | −7.8 (−9.3–−6.1) |
| Quality of life | 3.6±1.1 | 5.2±1.7* | 1.6 (0.9–2.3) | 4.2±0.7 | 5.9±0.8* | 1.7 (1.4–2.0) |
| β2-agonist use, inhal·day−1 | 2.8±3.2 | 0.5±0.8* | −2.4 (−4.0–0.7) | 2.1±1.8 | 0.3±0.5* | −1.8 (−2.4–−1.2) |
| FEV1 % predicted | 79.6±22.3 | 88.4±21.0* | 8.9 (0.5–17.4) | 80.4±15.5 | 89.8±14.0* | 9.5 (6.1–12.9) |
| FEV1 L | 2.7±0.7 | 3.1±0.07 | 0.3 (−0.01–−0.7) | 2.9±0.8 | 3.3±0.8 | 0.3 (0.2–0.5) |
| PC20 mg·mL−1 | 0.15 (0.14) | 2.1 (1.9)* | 1.7 (0.6–2.8) | 0.1 (0.09) | 1.3 (1.1)* | 1.9 (1.4–2.4)¶ |
| TCC 106·mL−1 | 1.4 (2.5) | 1.9 (1.9) | −0.1 (3.2) | 2.7 (1.9) | 2.2 (2.4) | 0.1 (1.1) |
| Sputum eosinophils % | 0.4 (1.0) | 0.1 (1.1) | 0.0 (1.0)# | 9.1 (13.6) | 1.0 (2.9)* | −8.7 (15.3) |
| Sputum eosinophils 106·mL−1 | 0.01 (0.01) | 0.02 (0.02) | 0.0 (0.01)# | 0.2 (1.7) | 0.01 (0.08)* | −0.1 (0.3) |
| Sputum neutrophils % | 30.3 (59.8) | 15.5 (20.4)* | −16.6 (42.9)# | 37.4 (36.4) | 22.0 (45.6) | −7.1 (27.4) |
| Sputum neutrophils 106·mL−1 | 0.7 (4.9) | 0.2 (0.8)* | −0.1 (4.2) | 0.4 (1.0) | 0.4 (0.9) | −0.07 (0.4) |
Data are presented as mean±sd, median (interquartile range), or mean (95% confidence interval)
ICS: inhaled corticosteroids
FEV1: forced expiratory volume in one second
PC20: provocative dose causing a 20% fall in FEV1
TCC: total cell count
*: p<0.05 for comparison between baseline and post-treatment with ICS within groups with and without sputum eosinophilia
#: p<0.05 for comparison between groups with and without sputum eosinophilia
¶: difference in PC20 expressed by difference in doubling dose of methacholine