Corresponding Author:
Gune Il Lim ,Tel: +82-54-468-9049, Fax: +82-54-463-7504, Email: guneil@yahoo.co.kr
ABSTRACT
Legal pulmonary disability in Korea is decided for chronic respiratory patients who have been diagnosed for a year or more, and the
patients haven’t gotten better after more than 2 months of sufficient treatment. The purpose of this study was to investigate the
clinical features and progress of those patients who have been diagnosed as having pulmonary disability. We reviewed retrospectively
the medical records of the patients who had been decided as having pulmonary disability at a secondary university hospital
from 2003 to 2010. The number of enrolled patients was 15 (male:female = 8:7) and their mean age was 62.4 ± 12.1 years. Of them,
the number of patients with a class 1 pulmonary disability were 4 (27%), class 2 patients were 3 (20%), and class 3 patients were 8
(53%). Their major underlying diseases were tuberculous destroyed lung (n = 7, 47%), chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (n =
5, 33%), and bronchiectasis (n = 2, 13%). After decision, 4 patients died: 2 patients were class 1, 1 was class 2, and 1 was class 3. All
of these patients died of their underlying pulmonary diseases or combined pneumonia. Further studies are needed to observe the
clinical progress and prognosis of patients with pulmonary disability by performing long-term follow-up for a large number of patients.
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