The European respiratory journal : official journal of the European Society for Clinical Respiratory Physiology
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Multicenter Study Observational Study
Management of patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis in clinical practice: the INSIGHTS-IPF registry.
After introduction of the new international guidelines on idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) in 2011, we investigated clinical management practices for patients with IPF according to physicians' diagnoses. A prospective, multicenter, noninterventional study with comprehensive quality measures including on-site source data verification was performed in Germany. 502 consecutive patients (171 newly diagnosed, 331 prevalent; mean±SD age 68.7±9.4 years, 77.9% males) with a mean disease duration of 2.3±3.5 years were enrolled. IPF diagnosis was based on clinical assessments and high-resolution computed tomography (HRCT) in 90.2%, and on surgical lung biopsy combined with histology in 34.1% (lavage in 61.8%). ⋯ They had more severe disease than those enrolled in recent randomised controlled trials. In addition to HRCT, the frequency of lung biopsies was surprisingly high. Treatment patterns varied substantially.