Bronchoscopische interventies voor ernstige COPD

• The current drug treatment of patients with severe and very severe COPD is often insufficient to achieve an acceptable quality of life.
• Surgical treatment of patients with COPD, by means of lung volume reduction surgery or lung transplantation is invasive and only available to a limited number of patients.
• Bronchoscopic lung volume reduction is a novel, minimally invasive, experimental treatment option for patients with severe COPD.
• Two different treatment options are currently available, depending on the type of pulmonary emphysema: bronchoscopic intervention with one-way endobronchial valves or with lung volume reduction coils.
• In selected patients with severe emphysema, bronchoscopic lung volume reduction brings about a clinically relevant improvement in pulmonary function, exercise capacity and quality of life.
• In view of the innovative and specialist nature of bronchoscopic lung volume reduction, it is prudent to perform this treatment in a centre of expertise for COPD.

Conflict of interest and financial support for this article: D.J. Slebos has received financial fees, devices for treatments and travel reimbursement from PneumRx and PulmonX, and he acted as a physician advisor for these companies. ICMJE forms provided by the authors are available online along with the full text of this article.