Emerging trends in the therapy of COPD: bronchodilators as mono- and combination therapies.

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a chronic inflammatory disease that is characterized by progressive airway obstruction that, unlike asthma, is relatively insensitive to bronchodilators and to the classic anti-inflammatory therapy, corticosteroids. In this review we consider the potential of bronchodilator drugs and corticosteroid drugs that are in clinical development for COPD and discuss how the best treatments might be achieved with combinations of drugs that are either already launched or close to launch.