Treating patients with COPD has been one of my most frequent tasks over the years. I was reflecting on the fact that the medications we use to treat this serious and progressive disease have not changed dramatically in over 40 years. Pulmonary physicians still use the same cocktail of drugs that provide bronchodilatation and inflammatory relief. Although the actual chemical nature of the drugs has changed and improved, we basically have been using the same kind of treatment plan for more than 4 decades. Despite multiple variations of the approved therapies and combinations, patients with COPD remain significantly symptomatic, with a substantial proportion of patients telling us that their symptoms substantially compromise their everyday life. This is why I was very interested to see that a new medication for COPD has now reached the marketplace.
This new drug works on an entirely different biochemical pathway to provide symptom relief to patient suffering from the airflow limitation associated with their COPD. The results of the testing performed on patients with moderate to severe COPD showed that this new therapy when added to their existing treatment showed significant improvement in airflow. The generic name of this new medication is ensifentrine and is just starting to become available and I believe pulmonologists will be offering it to their patients soon.
No treatment will cure COPD, but relieving symptoms is a major goal of therapy. Hopefully, medical insurances will make it easy and affordable for us to offer this new treatment to our patients.
