Associations of prior pulmonary tuberculosis with the incident COPD: a prospective cohort study

Background: Prior pulmonary tuberculosis (PTB) might be associated with the development of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). However, the impact of prior PTB on the risk of incident COPD has not been studied in a large prospective cohort study of the European population. Objectives: This study aimed to investigate the association of prior PTB with the risk of COPD. Design: Prospective cohort study. Methods: A multivariable Cox proportional model was used to estimate the hazard ratio (HR) and 95% confidence interval (95% CI) for the association of prior PTB with COPD. Subgroup analyses were further conducted among individuals stratified by age, sex, body mass index, smoking status, drinking status, physical activity, and polygenic risk score (PRS). Results: The study involved a total of 216,130 participants, with a median follow-up period of 12.6 years and 2788 incident cases of COPD. Individuals with a prior history of PTB at baseline had an 87% higher risk of developing incident COPD compared to those without such history [adjusted hazard ratio (aHR) = 1.87; 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.26–2.77; p = 0.002]. Subgroup analysis revealed that individuals having prior PTB history presented a higher risk of incident COPD among individuals who were aged from 50 to 59 years with aHR of 2.47 (1.02–5.95, p = 0.044), older than 59 years with aHR of 1.81 (1.16–2.81, p = 0.008), male with aHR of 2.37 (1.47–3.83, p < 0.001), obesity with aHR of 3.35 (2.16–5.82, p < 0.001), previous smoking with aHR of 2.27 (1.39–3.72, p < 0.001), current drinking with aHR of 1.98 (1.47–3.83, p < 0.001), low physical activity with aHR of 2.62 (1.30–5.26, p = 0.007), and low PRS with aHR of 3.24 (1.61–6.53, p < 0.001), as well as high PRS with aHR of 2.43 (1.15–5.14, p = 0.019). Conclusion: A history of PTB is an important independent risk factor for COPD. Clinical staff should be aware of this risk factor in patients with prior PTB, particularly in countries or regions with high burdens of PTB.