EDITORIALS
Airways disease: just nosing around?
Royal National Throat Nose & Ear Hospital and Royal Free Hospital NHS Trust, London, UK
Correspondence to:
Correspondence to Dr G K Scadding, Royal National Throat Nose & Ear Hospital, Department of Allergy and Medical Rhinology, 330 Gray’s Inn Road, London WC1X 8DA, UK; g.scadding@ucl.ac.uk
| The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below. |
The airway is a continuous structure extending from the nasal vestibule to the alveoli, with the same pseudostratified ciliated columnar epithelium along much of its length. While an arbitrary line at the level of the vocal cords divides the airway into upper and lower subdivisions—a concept introduced in medical school anatomy tutorials and continued in patient care—airways disease does not conform to such specific anatomical regions. Upper and lower airway disease often coexist, with upper airway involvement often preceding that of the lower airway and even determining severity of disease and quality of life.1 This recognition has led to the development of the terms "united airways" and "one airway, one disease".
The nose is an air conditioner—filtering, warming and humidifying over 10 000 litres of air daily before it progresses to the lungs. The nasal passages and associated structures bear the brunt of environmental contact, being the first site of
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