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Results of clinical examination, bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) cytology, acute phase proteins and markers of pulmonary haemostasisand fibrinolysis (fibrinogen, serum amyloid A, D-dimers) were compared between controls and horses affected by respiratory disease. Using a clinical scoring system, 58 horses were classified as free of respiratory disease (controls, n=15), recurrent airway obstruction (RAO, n=18), inflammatory airway disease (IAD, n=14) or chronic interstitial pneumopathy (CIP, n=11). No significant differences were found in fibrinogen concentration, but descriptive data analysis showed a trend towards lower values for controls (median 0.0024g/l) compared to chronic pneumopathies (median 0.0052g/l), in particular RAO (median 0.0062g/l). Fibrinogen concentration was positively correlated with the percentage of neutrophils in BALF cytology (rs=0.377, p=0.004). SAA concentrations were very low and in 65.5% of samples below the limit of detection. D-dimer concentrations were also very low and quantifiable concentrations could only be measured after ultrafiltration and only in RAO (median 0.1 mg/l). In conclusion, there was only slight evidence of increased coagulatory activity in equine chronic pneumopathies apart from RAO. It remains speculative, if fibrinogen and D-dimers are increased due to their role as acute-phase proteins or if the data may be interpreted as a misbalance of coagulation and fibrinolysis.