Surgery vs non-surgical treatment for bronchiectasis

Standard treatment for bronchiectasis comprises postural drainage and various regimes of antibiotic therapy. If the disease is confined to localised areas of lung, surgical resection of the affected segments is often performed.

To assess the benefit of surgical resection compared with standard ("conservative") treatment.

The Cochrane Airways Group trials register derived from MEDLINE, EMBASE and hand searching of major journals was searched using the terms [bronchiect* AND surg* OR resection OR lobect* OR pneumonect* OR segementect*].

Only randomised, controlled trials were considered

The titles, abstracts and citations were independently reviewed by the two reviewers to assess potential relevance for full review. STATISTICAL CONSIDERATIONS Not applicable

No randomised or controlled clinical trials were found, other than case series or case-controlled studies.

Surgical treatment of bronchiectasis is widely used, but there appear to be no randomised controlled trials. It is not possible to provide an unbiased estimate of its benefit compared to conservative therapy.