Clinical therapy of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis

Objective To investigate the clinical effect of recombinant human interferon-γ(IFN-γ) combined with hormone on idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis(IPF).Methods Thirty-six patients with IPF were randomly divided into group A and B,with 18 patients in each group.Patients in group A were given Prednisone (0.5 mg/kg)every day according to body weight,the dose was halved after four weeks,the dose was reduced to 10-20 mg/d in 3-4 months treatment.Patients in group B were given subcutaneous injection of IFN-γ 200 U,besides the same treatment of group A.The clinical effect of the two groups were compared one month after treatment.Results The clinical symptoms and improvement in pulmonary diffusion of group B were better than those in group A,the differences were statistically significant (P ＜0.05).Level of serum Ⅲ-C,Ⅳ-C and HA of the two groups were lower than before treatment significantly (P ＜ 0.05),and level of serum Ⅲ-C,Ⅳ-C and HA of group B were lower than those of group A,the differences were statistically significant (P ＜ 0.05).Conclusions The effect of subcutaneous injection of IFN-γcombined with hormone on IPF is better than hormone therapy only. Key words: Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis ;  Recombinant human interferon-γ;  Hormone ;  Clinical effect