Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease and the Physical Examination

Performing a hypothesis-driven examination in patients with possible chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is an important component of increasing the recognition and diagnosis of this avoidable and costly medical condition. Using known likelihood ratios for various physical examination maneuvers can be combined with known individual risk factors and symptoms to adjust a patient's post-test probability of having COPD and inform appropriate diagnostic work-up. Equally important is intentionality in history-taking and physical examination procedures for patients with known COPD to mitigate the decreased quality of life and mortality and to monitor response to treatment.