• Yaa-Hui Dong, Chia-Hsuin Chang, Fe-Lin Lin Wu, Li-Jiuan Shen, Calverley Peter M A PMA Clinical Science Center, University Hospital Aintree, Liverpool, England., Claes-Göran Löfdahl, Mei-Shu Lai, and Donald A Mahler.
• National Taiwan University Health Data Research Center, Taipei, Taiwan; Graduate Institute of Clinical Pharmacy, and Department of Pharmacy, College of Medicine, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan; Center of Comparative Effectiveness Research, National Center of Excellence for Clinical Trial and Research, Department of Internal Medicine, Department of Pharmacy, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
• Chest. 2014 Jun 1; 145 (6): 1286-1297.

AbstractBackground: The use of inhaled corticosteroids (ICSs) is associated with an increased risk of pneumonia in patients with COPD. However, the risks of other respiratory infections, such as TB and influenza, remain unclear.Methods: Through a comprehensive literature search of MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, Cochrane Library, and ClinicalTrials.gov from inception to July 2013, we identified randomized controlled trials of ICS therapy lasting at least 6 months. We conducted meta-analyses by the Peto, Mantel-Haenszel, and Bayesian approaches to generate summary estimates comparing ICS with non-ICS treatment on the risk of TB and influenza.Results: Twenty-fi ve trials (22,898 subjects) for TB and 26 trials (23,616 subjects) for influenza were included. Compared with non-ICS treatment, ICS treatment was associated with a significantly higher risk of TB (Peto OR, 2.29; 95% CI, 1.04-5.03) but not influenza (Peto OR, 1.24;95% CI, 0.94-1.63). Results were similar with each meta-analytic approach. Furthermore, the number needed to harm to cause one additional TB event was lower for patients with COPD treated with ICSs in endemic areas than for those in nonendemic areas (909 vs 1,667, respectively).Conclusions: This study raises safety concerns about the risk of TB and influenza associated with ICS use in patients with COPD, which deserve further investigation.

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