[Relationship between combined emphysema, pulmonary hypertension and %FEV1 in patients with idiopathic interstitial pneumonia].

The prognosis of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is poor, and it deteriorates when it is complicated with pulmonary hypertension (PH). Forced vital capacity (FVC) is a useful parameter for evaluating the disease status of interstitial pneumonia (IP). However, in patients with IP complicated with emphysema, the disease severity can be overlooked because of relatively well preserved FVC. We investigated the correlation between the maximum pressure gradient (PG) in the tricuspid valve using echocardiographic measurements and pulmonary function tests in patients with IP without emphysema and in those with IP with emphysema. There was an inverse correlation between PG and %FVC in patients with IP without emphysema. However, the above inverse correlation between PG and %FVC mentioned above disappeared when analyzed in the whole cohort of patients (n = 42) consisting of IP without emphysema (n = 35) and IP with emphysema (n = 7). Patients with IP without emphysema did not show a correlation between PG and %FEV1, but when analyzed using the whole cohort of patients an inverse correlation between PG and %FEV1 was observed (p<0.05). In clinical practice, not only FVC, but also %FEV1 is a valuable parameter in investigating the complication of emphysema and PH in patients with chronic idiopathic interstitial pneumonia.