Extract
The burden of pleural disease continues to increase internationally leading to significant healthcare costs and an urgent need for improving management. Pleural effusion is a common presentation for many pulmonary and systemic diseases, and it is estimated that each year 1.5 million people develop a pleural effusion in the USA and 200 000–250 000 in the UK [1, 2]. Despite the prevalence of pleural disease, advances in research in the field have not been equal to other fields in respiratory medicine, including much rarer conditions. By way of example, talc pleurodesis (proposed in 1935) remains the standard therapy for symptomatic malignant pleural effusion in many centres [3]; very few diseases in medicine are currently managed in the same way as they were 80 years ago.
Abstract
This editorial provides an update on pleural research and aims to highlight the areas that will be covered in the review series http://ow.ly/4mQDyK
Footnotes
Support statement: I. Psallidas is the recipient of a REPSIRE2 European Respiratory Society Fellowship (RESPIRE2–2015–7160). Funding information for this article has been deposited with FundRef.
Conflict of interest: None declared.
Provenance: Submitted article, peer reviewed.
- Received April 5, 2016.
- Accepted April 15, 2016.
- Copyright ©ERS 2016.
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