Cardiovascular Comorbidities and Bronchiectasis

Bronchiectasis have multiple etiologies but share a similar bronchial injury associated with inflammation, which leads to a progressive lung deterioration. This disease is responsible for a frequent access to care with an exacerbation rate of 1.8 per year with a high risk of hospitalization. Natural history is marked by recurrent infectious diseases which are the main prognosis factor. This disease is associated with an inflammation rate in the lung as well as in the blood. Up to now, no study has been described comorbidities associated with this chronic disease but our hypothesis is that cardiovascular diseases will be more frequent in these patients. In fact systemic inflammation driven by bronchial infections may increase frequency of cardiovascular diseases.

The investigators decide to conduct a monocentric observational study to define the prevalence and characterization of cardiovascular comorbidities as well as markers of accelerated aging. We would like to test the hypothesis that cardiovascular comorbidities are frequent in bronchiectasis and may be associated with markers of inflammation and aging.

Phenotype of the lung disease will include: spirometry, plethysmography, DLCO measurement according to the ATS/ERS guideline. 6M walking test and echocardiography will be also performed.

Frequency of comorbidities will be calculated with data from questionnaire as well as standardized explorations.

Aging related manifestations will be measured: arterial stiffness using aortic pulse wave velocity, bone mineral density using dual energy X-ray absorptiometry. Appendicular skeletal muscle mass and grip test were also performed.

Blood test were also performed to measure inflammatory markers, cytokines and length of telomere in circulating leucocytes.