Cecile S. Rose, MD, MPH

A Wednesday morning session will explore the inhalational exposures and respiratory outcomes of military deployment to the Middle East. Presenters will review current knowledge on complex inhalational exposures, epidemiologic studies, animal toxicology studies, and clinical lung findings in U.S. military men and women who are returning from the Middle East.

D6 “Occupational Lung Diseases in U.S. Military Personnel Deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan” will take place from 8:15 to 10:45 a.m. in the Wells Fargo Theatre Section 1 on the street level of the Colorado Convention Center.

The symposium will interest researchers and clinicians alike, said co-chair Cecile S. Rose, MD, MPH, who is professor at National Jewish Health and the University of Colorado in Denver.

Researchers face a number of issues, Dr. Rose explained. For one, “there are the uncertainties regarding lung disease risk and pathogenesis, including the incidence and prevalence of lung disease in the potentially exposed population,” she said.

Further challenges include the spectrum of possible lung diseases that may be occurring from Middle East exposures, such as asthma, constrictive bronchiolitis, acute eosinophilic pneumonia and rhinosinusitis, and the variability in exposures that may confer risk, including particulate matter from desert dusts, burn pits, vehicle exhaust and tobacco smoke.

Clinicians face a different set of challenges with this patient population, including “the role of targeted medical surveillance in determining the need for further respiratory diagnostic evaluation and, importantly, the role of surgical lung biopsy in clinical diagnosis of post-deployment lung disease,” she said.

Anthony M. Szema, MD, of Stony Brook School of Medicine, N.Y., will co-chair the symposium.