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Volatile Organic Compounds in Exhaled Breath of Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis for Discrimination from Healthy Subjects

  • Interstitial lung disease
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Abstract

Purpose Human breath analysis is proposed with increasing frequency as a useful tool in clinical application. We performed this study to find the characteristic volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in the exhaled breath of patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) for discrimination from healthy subjects. Methods VOCs in the exhaled breath of 40 IPF patients and 55 healthy controls were measured using a multi-capillary column and ion mobility spectrometer. The patients were examined by pulmonary function tests, blood gas analysis, and serum biomarkers of interstitial pneumonia. Results We detected 85 VOC peaks in the exhaled breath of IPF patients and controls. IPF patients showed 5 significant VOC peaks; p-cymene, acetoin, isoprene, ethylbenzene, and an unknown compound. The VOC peak of p-cymene was significantly lower (p < 0.001), while the VOC peaks of acetoin, isoprene, ethylbenzene, and the unknown compound were significantly higher (p < 0.001 for all) compared with the peaks of controls. Comparing VOC peaks with clinical parameters, negative correlations with VC (r =−0.393, p = 0.013), %VC (r =−0.569, p < 0.001), FVC (r = −0.440, p = 0.004), %FVC (r =−0.539, p < 0.001), DLco (r =−0.394, p = 0.018), and %DLco (r =−0.413, p = 0.008) and a positive correlation with KL-6 (r = 0.432, p = 0.005) were found for p-cymene. Conclusion We found characteristic 5 VOCs in the exhaled breath of IPF patients. Among them, the VOC peaks of p-cymene were related to the clinical parameters of IPF. These VOCs may be useful biomarkers of IPF.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank Mr. Yusuke Yonemura (Harada Corp, Osaka, Japan) for his technical supports. A part of the work on this paper (JIBB) has been supported by Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) within the Collaborative Research Center (Sonderforschungsbereich) SFB 876 “Providing Information by Resource-Constrained Analysis”, project TB1 “Resource-Constrained Analysis of Spectrometry Data”.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Respiratory Medicine and Allergology, Sapporo Medical University School of Medicine, South-1 West-16, Chuo-ku, Sapporo, 060-8543, Japan

    Yu-ichi Yamada, Gen Yamada, Mitsuo Otsuka, Hirotaka Nishikiori, Kimiyuki Ikeda, Yasuaki Umeda, Koji Kuronuma, Hirofumi Chiba & Hiroki Takahashi

  2. Department of Public Health, Sapporo Medical University School of Medicine, South-1 West-16, Chuo-ku, Sapporo, 060-8543, Japan

    Hirofumi Ohnishi

  3. Department of Chemistry & Center for Research and Education “Process Analysis & Technology”, Reutlingen University, Alteburgstrasse 150, 72762, Reutlingen, Germany

    Jörg Ingo Baumbach

  4. Department of Respiratory Medicine, Hakodate Goryoukaku Hospital, 38-3 Goryoukaku-cho, Hakodate, Hokkaido, 040-8611, Japan

    Yu-ichi Yamada

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  1. Yu-ichi Yamada
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Correspondence to Gen Yamada.

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Yamada, Yi., Yamada, G., Otsuka, M. et al. Volatile Organic Compounds in Exhaled Breath of Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis for Discrimination from Healthy Subjects. Lung 195, 247–254 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00408-017-9979-3

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