Clinical research studyAirway obstruction in never smokers: Results from the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey
Section snippets
Study population
The NHANES III was conducted from 1988 to 1994 by the National Center for Health Statistics. By using a stratified multistage clustered probability sample, the survey was designed to identify an unbiased sample that could, using appropriate weights, be extrapolated to the entire civilian noninstitutionalized US population. Study participants completed extensive household and personal health questionnaires and underwent a comprehensive physical examination, including spirometry. A total of 81
Results
Persons who had never smoked made up 42% of the NHANES III population aged 30 to 80 years (Table 1). The total final (crude) study population of never smokers was 4544, representing a weighted study population of 49 993 344 persons. Rates of airway obstruction were 91.2 per 1000 (95% confidence interval: 78.0-104.3) in never smokers, less than half of the rate seen in current and former smokers. There were an estimated 4.56 million persons with no smoking history who had airway obstruction on the
Discussion
This analysis suggests some degree of airway obstruction in more than 9% of US never smokers aged more than 30 years. Less than one fifth of these persons reported a history of asthma alone (ie, without also reporting a diagnosis of emphysema or chronic bronchitis), and another 13% reported a prior diagnosis of COPD, leaving the majority with no reported diagnosis of obstructive respiratory disease.
Our estimates of airway obstruction rates in never smokers are higher than those reported
Acknowledgments
The authors thank Dr. Eva Hnizdo, who provided code for calculating NHANES III industrial categories, and Dr. Jim Thomasson for programming support.
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2018, Respiratory MedicineCitation Excerpt :In that study lower educational levels were related to CAO in never smoking subjects aged 60 years and older [20]. All together chronic airway obstruction among never smokers seems to be fairly prevalent, even though the prevalence is different over the world The causes are not fully known and only a limited number of studies have described this population in detail [4,20–22]. It should, however, be noted that the prevalence of CAO is related to how CAO is defined.
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This project was supported by Boehringer Ingelheim International GmbH and Pfizer Inc.