Eva Pedersen won this prize for her abstract «Low incidence and severity of SARS-CoV-2 infections in people with primary ciliary dyskinesia (PCD)». Using data from COVID-PCD, the largest international study following people with a rare respiratory disease during the COVID-19 pandemic, Eva showed that people with PCD do not seem to have a higher incidence nor a higher risk of severe COVID-19 disease than the general population.
The European Respiratory Society (ERS) rewards the authors of the best-graded abstract within each of its scientific Assemblies. Myrofora Goutaki won this year’s Best Abstract award for the Paediatrics Assembly, for her abstract «Otologic features in patients with PCD- an EPIC-PCD study». The abstract presented first results on patient-reported ear symptoms and standardised findings of ear examination of 397 patients with PCD. Her results showed that although acute problems mostly resolve after childhood, adults with PCD still report many symptoms from the ears and have signs of chronic disease at examination. Patient-reported hearing problems do not always correspond with audiometry findings, highlighting the need for regular follow-up and hearing assessment for PCD patients even when patients do not report problems. The EPIC-PCD study is the first prospective, multi-centre international study focusing on the understudied area of ear and upper airways problems in patients with PCD, including patients from 10 countries.
More than 10000 delegates attended the ERS Congress on site and several thousands online. Results from the COVID-PCD and the EPIC-PCD studies were also presented at the international BEAT-PCD/ERN Lung meeting in Barcelona, the day before the ERS Congress. The PCD meeting, co-organised by Myrofora Goutaki, had more than 250 onsite and online attendees, including researchers, clinicians, and patient-representatives from Europe, North America, and Australia.
