Heart and lung in the old age. The association between COPD and cardiovascular diseases: How much and how

The association COPD-Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) - in particular heart failure - is a wellknown phenomenon that invest COPD of a new clinical dimension. Given the high occurrence of both diseases, their association - also due to common risk factors - is not surprising. An additive contribution to this association is given by: the Aging effect (progressive development of a pro-inflammatory and pro-thrombotic state), the COPD effect (the emphysema impaired the systolic ventricular function; the increasing of the systemic inflammation through a mechanism of overspill; neuro-umoral activation). A particular attention to the cardiac function should be used in exacerbations of COPD. Due to the peculiar diagnostic, prognostic and therapeutics problems, the association between COPD and CVD cannot be ignored by the future guidelines, taking into account that in the general population the cardiovascular mortality is reducing, whether in COPD patients it is increasing.