Karkkainen M, et al. - Researchers sought to determine the causes of death in patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) taking into account differences between genders and smoking histories as well as disease progression. They analyzed data from national database of IPF patients treated in Kuopio University Hospital (KUH) from 2002 to 2012 and death registry database. They found males with IPF had higher overall mortality but females had higher disease-specific mortality for IPF i.e. in males, comorbidities were more often the underlying causes of death. As females and non-smokers were less likely to succumb to pneumonia, a possible association of pneumonia-triggered acute exacerbations with smoking and gender was suggested. Overall, a variance may be seen in disease progression at the end of life depending on smoking habits and gender.