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Article History

Received: 19 April 2016

Revised: 8 June 2016

Accepted: 21 August 2016

First Online: 13 October 2016

Competing interests

: All authors have completed the Unified Competing Interest form at www.icmje.org/coi_disclosure.pdf and declare: AN and JBS are employees of RiRL. DR is Strategic Clinical Director at OPC. FA and DS are employees of OPC. DP has board membership with Aerocrine, Almirall, Amgen, AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, Chiesi, Meda, Mundipharma, Napp, Novartis and Teva Pharmaceuticals; consultancy with Almirall, Amgen, AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, Chiesi, GlaxoSmithKline, Meda, Mundipharma, Napp, Novartis and Teva Pharmaceuticals; grants and unrestricted funding for investigator-initiated studies from UK National Health Service, British Lung Foundation, Aerocrine, AKL Ltd, Almirall, AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, Chiesi, Eli Lilly, GlaxoSmithKline, Meda, Merck, Mundipharma, Napp, Novartis, Orion, Pfizer, Respiratory Effectiveness Group, Takeda, Teva Pharmaceuticals and Zentiva; payments for lectures/speaking from Almirall, AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, Chiesi, Cipla, GlaxoSmithKline, Kyorin, Meda, Merck, Mundipharma, Novartis, Pfizer, SkyePharma, Takeda and Teva Pharmaceuticals; payment for manuscript preparation from Mundipharma and Teva Pharmaceuticals; patents (planned, pending or issued) from AKL Ltd; payment for the development of educational materials from GlaxoSmithKline and Novartis; stock/stock options from AKL Ltd that produces phytopharmaceuticals; owns 80% of Research in Real Life Ltd and its subsidiary social enterprise Optimum Patient Care; received payment for travel/accommodations/meeting expenses from Aerocrine, Boehringer Ingelheim, Mundipharma, Napp, Novartis and Teva Pharmaceuticals; funding for patient enrolment or completion of research from Almirall, Chiesi, Teva Pharmaceuticals and Zentiva; and peer reviewer for grant committees of the Medical Research Council (2014), Efficacy and Mechanism Evaluation programme (2012), HTA (2014). During the past 36 months, EVG received grants or personal fees from ALK ABELLO, AstraZeneca, Bayer, BMS, Boehringer Ingelheim, GlaxoSmithKline, IMS, LASER, Merck Sharp and Dohme. The remaining authors declare no conflict of interest.