Effectiveness of steroid therapy on pneumonic chronic obstructive pulmonary disease exacerbation: a multi-centred retrospective cohort study

Background To date, no consensus exists on the effects of steroid use on pneumonic chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) owing to trial design issues in previous trials involving these conditions. Therefore, we aimed to evaluate steroid effectiveness in pneumonic COPD exacerbation patients. Methods This multi-centred, retrospective, observational study was conducted across five acute general hospitals in Japan. We analysed the association between parenteral/oral steroid therapy and time to clinical stability in pneumonic COPD exacerbation. We used a validated algorithm derived from the 10th revision of the International Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD-10) to include pneumonic COPD exacerbation patients. We excluded patients with other hypoxia causes (asthma exacerbation, pneumothorax, heart failure) and complicated pneumonia (obstructive pneumonia, empyema), those who required tracheal intubation/vasopressors, and those who were clinically...