Inhaled corticosteroids in COPD - Author's reply (1)

AUTHORS’ REPLY We would like to thank Dr
Hart for his useful comment.We agree that it
is important that the absolute numbers of
cells are presented when measuring differential
cell count in a biological sample. In fact,
fig 1 of our paper illustrated the reduction of
sputum neutrophils as absolute cell numbers.
We thank Dr Hart for the table where the
data have been presented as mean absolute
cell counts, showing no difference in the
absolute number of macrophages after treatment
and confirming that the increase in the
proportion of sputum macrophages following
treatment is attributable to the reduced
number of sputum neutrophils. However, the
presentation of data as absolute cell numbers did not change the major conclusion of our
article that a two month course of treatment
with high dose inhaled beclomethasone
dipropionate significantly reduces the sputum
neutrophil cell count in patients with
clinically stable, smoking related COPD.