Hippocrates (460-377 BC) – The father of medicine had described old men suffering from breathlessness associated with catarrh and cough.
Some of the earliest references to the description of emphysema include:
Bonnet’s description of “voluminous lungs” in 1679: Morgagni’s (1769) description of
19 cases in which the lungs were “turgid”, particularly from air.
Bierner (1855) - credited for having recognized the importance of the study of sputum in broncho pulmonary disease.
Daus and Luestscher (1915)- studied the application of bacteriological sputum examination and recognition of H.influenzae as a common cause of acute and chronic bacterial bronchitis. …show more content…
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Figure 1: chest x ray P/A view showing emphysema features
The beginnings of our clinical understanding of the chronic bronchitis component of COPD can be traced to Badham (1814), who used the word catarrah to chronic cough and mucus hypersecretion that are cardinal symptoms. He described bronchiolitis and chronic bronchitis as disabling disorders.8
Our present knowledge of the disease is founded on the clinical work of Laennec
(1821) who recognized a condition called “Catarrhe muqueux” which corresponds to what we call “Chronic bronchitis” and a “cattarrthe suffocant” which corresponds to what is known today as bronchiolitis. He also recognized a condition called “Catarrhesec” which is perhaps the same as allergic or asthmatic bronchitis.8
William Briscoe is believed to be the first person to use the term COPD in discussion at the 9th Aspen Emphysema Conference. This term became
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established and today we refer to COPD as the designation of this growing health