Hong Kong Respiratory Medicine

Message from ACCP (HK & Macau Chapter ) president Dr Johnny Wai-Man Chan, June 2011
Dr Johnny Wai-Man CHAN, President of the ACCP (HK and Macau Chapter)

Last year, known as the “Year of the Lung” has been a remarkable and memorable one. Our Chapter, in association with Hong Kong Thoracic Society and Hong Kong Lung Foundation, had organized and participated in numerous activities that aimed to alert the public about the importance of respiratory diseases and lung health. The enthusiastic participation of members and fellow colleagues from various local institutions and sectors had been the key factor for the successful organization of such activities. Apart from the general population, the importance of prevention, early diagnosis and timely management of chronic lung diseases was also channeled to the other partners of the healthcare sector including family physicians, general practitioners, nurse and allied health colleagues. Instead of being complacent of what the local respiratory circle had accomplished last year, the efforts should be continued in order to keep up with the momentum gathered during the past year.

Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) has been the number five killer in Hong Kong in 2008 and was responsible for more than 30000 hospital discharges and deaths in that year. With our ageing population and persistently high smoking rate, we would not be immune from the pessimistic forecast from World Health Organization (WHO) that it would become the third leading cause of death in the world in the coming one or two decades. Perhaps in response to the awareness of the disease gravity, our government has recently provided extra funding to our public institutions in prescribing the relatively new and expensive drugs for COPD. However, as smoking cessation and initiation of therapy in the early COPD patients might slow down the disease progression, early recognition of the possibility of having COPD in the at-risk population and timely diagnosis with spirometry would potentially help to ameliorate the future disease burden.

As a result, a series of activities are under planning by the local Chest Societies to promote the awareness of symptoms and importance of COPD, together with the use of spirometry as a valuable diagnostic tool in our local community. These would include public education via the various media, spirometric screening in at-risk populations in the community, press release and a carnival. As members of the local respiratory circle, your participation in such meaningful events would be both valuable and meaningful. Let’s watch out for these activities and contribute our parts!