Patients’ follow-up within twelve months after fibreoptic bronchoscopy
Following fibreoptic bronchoscopy, patients from both the “Low-Ex” and “High-Ex” groups were more frequently treated by antibiotics than those from the “No-Ex” group without any difference between “Low-Ex” and “High-Ex” (Table 2). However, the percentages of patients with pathogenic bacteria in the BALF treated by antibiotics after fibreoptic bronchoscopy were not significantly different between the three groups (Table 2).
During the twelve months after fibreoptic bronchoscopy, the proportion of patients admitted at least once in the emergency department was increased in both “Low-Ex” and “High-Ex” vs. “No-Ex” and the proportion of patients requiring at least one hospitalization for wheeze were significantly increased in descending order of frequency in “High-Ex” compared to “Low-Ex” compared to “No-Ex” (Table 2). In addition, the proportion of patients requiring an increased daily dose of inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) was higher in “High-Ex” compared to the two other groups whereas the proportion of patients with unchanged daily dose of ICS was not significantly different between the three groups (Table 2).
During the follow-up period, there were no significant differences between groups according to the number of patients treated with ICS, leukotriene receptor antagonists, long-acting beta2-agonists, antihistamine agents (Table 2). By contrast, there were higher daily doses of ICS in “High-Ex” (1600µg [1000; 2000]) than in both “Low-Ex” (1000µg [800; 2000]) and “No-Ex” patients (1000 [425; 1000], p<0.001).