Stage 2 (moderate) COPD: You may experience persistent coughing and phlegm (often worse in the morning), increased shortness of breath, tiredness, sleep problems, or wheezing. About one in five people have exacerbations that worsen their symptoms and cause the color of their phlegm to change.
Anything you had in the first stage often gets worse in stage II. Not everyone gets the same symptoms, but you may have: Constant coughing, along with mucus, that's often worse in the morning. Shortness of breath that makes even household chores a challenge.
Smoking Plays a Role
For men age 65 who smoke, the drop in life expectancy is: Stage 1: 0.3 years. Stage 2: 2.2 years.
There are four distinct stages of COPD: mild, moderate, severe, and very severe. Your physician will determine your stage based on results from a breathing test called a spirometry, which assesses lung function by measuring how much air you can breathe in and out and how quickly and easily you can exhale.
Doctors consider stage 2 COPD to be moderate. When a person has stage 2 COPD, their symptoms can include shortness of breath, chronic cough, and frequent respiratory infections. COPD will generally become more severe as the disease progresses.
Stage 2 COPD life expectancy is 2.2 years.
Can you live 10 or 20 years with COPD? The exact length of time you can live with COPD depends on your age, health, and symptoms. Especially if your COPD is diagnosed early, if you have mild stage COPD, and your disease is well managed and controlled, you may be able to live for 10 or even 20 years after diagnosis.
Although COPD is terminal, people may not always die of the condition directly, or of oxygen deprivation. Some people with COPD have other medical conditions, particularly cardiovascular disease. In fact, within 5 years of diagnosis, COPD is also an independent risk factor for sudden cardiac death.
Patients with stage II COPD would benefit from cardiopulmonary rehabilitation and both long- and short-acting bronchodilators. Stage III COPD treatment includes cardiopulmonary rehabilitation, an inhaled steroid for repeated exacerbations, and both long- and short-acting bronchodilators.
Often, patients live with mild COPD for several decades before the disease progresses to moderate or severe. However, each patient is unique. Although it is not as common, some COPD cases quickly progress from mild to moderate in just a few months.
Results: The average age of death was 77.4 years. The majority of patients died in hospital. The major symptom reported by the carers was breathlessness which impaired the deceased's mobility and contributed to their being housebound.
While it's true that COPD can't be cured or reversed, there is a lot you can do to manage your symptoms, prevent further damage to your lungs, and get back to doing more of the things you enjoy.
Some people can live with mild or moderate COPD for decades. Other people may be diagnosed with more advanced COPD and progress to very severe disease much faster. Some of this boils down to genetics. But some of it is due to how much you smoke or smoked and the level of lung irritants you are exposed to.
Which has worse symptoms? Because emphysema is a late stage of COPD, the signs and symptoms are similar. If you have emphysema, you are already experiencing COPD symptoms, though earlier stages of COPD will not have as dramatic an impact as the degree of tissue degeneration is minimal.
Stage IV: Very Severe
You doctor may prescribe supplemental oxygen to help with your breathing.
Freezing temperatures, stronger winds, and drier air conditions can make breathing more difficult, especially if you're living with COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease).
The main symptoms of COPD are breathlessness, chronic cough and sputum (mucus or phlegm) production. Cigarette smokers and ex-smokers are most at risk of COPD. There is no cure for COPD, and the damaged airways don't regenerate.
There's currently no cure for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), but treatment can help slow the progression of the condition and control the symptoms.
Type 2 respiratory failure is commonly caused by COPD but may also be caused by chest-wall deformities, respiratory muscle weakness and Central nervous system depression (CNS depression.) CNS depression is associated with reduced respiratory drive and is often a side effect of sedatives and strong opioids.
By improving your lifestyle, you can live a long and full life with COPD. A common misinterpretation is that 'Chronic' means really bad or extreme rather than long term. Individuals who exercise more and maintain a healthy weight can experience less severe symptoms and enjoy a better quality of life.
So relatively, you can stay at the mild stage of the disease forever, with lots of work and a little luck. We measure lung function in how much air you can blow out in the first second of expiration (the FEV1 on a spirometry or PFT). We measure it in liters.
There are people who have lived with stage 4 COPD for many years; upward of 20, so it doesn't have to be a death sentence. With the right combination of daily exercise, no smoking, weight control, meds and not letting yourself get really sick, you may be able to live for a very long time.
Airflow obstruction is associated with increased mortality, even with mild impairment. In mild to moderate COPD, most deaths are due to cardiovascular disease and lung cancer, but as COPD severity increases, respiratory deaths are increasingly common.