Disease Information for Interstitial lung disease, chronic

Pneumonia, Interstitial;Bronchiolitis Obliterans Organizing Pneumonia (Boop);Chronic Fibrous Pneumonia; Diffuse Alveolar Damage; Fibrous Interstitial Pneumonia; Giant Cell Interstitial Pneumonia; Idiopathic Interstitial Pneumonia;

Usual Interstitial Pneumonia (UIP); Acute Interstitial Pneumonia (AIP); Cryptogenic Organizing Pneumonia (COP); Desquamative Interstitial Pneumonia (DIP);

Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis (IPF); Lymphoid Interstitial Pneumonia (LIP); Nonspecific Interstitial Pneumonia (NSIP);

Respiratory Bronchiolitis-Associated Interstitial Lung Disease (RB-ILD); The abnormal accumulation of inflammatory cells in lung tissue may lead to any one of several disorders with similar signs and symptoms; As white blood cells and protein-rich plasma build up in the air sacs of the lungs (alveoli), inflammation is generated; The inflammatory process, if it lasts long enough, may harden the fluid and the resultant firm, fibrous substance (scarring) may replace the lung tissue; If the scarring is extensive, the air sacs may be destroyed over time and the resultant space replaced by cysts; The American Thoracic Society and the European Respiratory Society jointly studied the interstitial pneumonias during 2001 and issued a Multidisciplinary Consensus Classification of the Idiopathic Interstitial Pneumonias; This consensus statement was intended to replace several older classification schemes that had led to a confusion of names and syndromes; Participants agreed that the Idiopathic Interstitial Pneumonias (IIPs) comprise a number of clinical entities that are each rare and sufficiently different from one another to be considered as distinct disorders; This report follows the joint ARS/ERS classification-----------[NORD 2005]--------------Interstitial pneumonias are a confusing and frustrating set of diseases both for the treating physician and for the diagnostic pathologist; One source of the confusion has been the lack of overlapping terms that treating physicians and pathologists use; For example, idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a clinical term describing a slowly progressive, chronic interstitial pneumonia; Since many of the interstitial pneumonias, including UIP, DIP, and NSIP, fall under this category, it is a non-specific term; Most pathologists who are experts in lung pathology use the terms IPF and UIP to mean the same disease process; To complicate matters even further, European clinicians utilize the term cryptogenic fibrosing alveolitis for IPF; Bronchiolitis obliterans with organizing pneunomina (BOOP) is no longer used because it has been considered a mixture of terms; Lymphocytic interstitial pneumonia (LIP) is now considered a lymphoproliferative disease; Giant cell interstitial pneumonitis (GIP) is now considered a hard metal pneumoconiosis; The symptoms vary for each of the pneumonias but most are characterized by a slowly progressive shortness of breath; Chest radiographs reveal a hazy ground glass appearance with linear opacities; Most of the diseases are progressive and are treated with corticosteroids;

----------[DoctorsDoctor-com 2005]-----

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