Introduction Chronic obstructive lung disease is not only a major cause of morbidity and mortality, but is also the major reason for intensive care unit (ICU) admission. Cardiac function is often impaired in this disease, but its association with clinical outcome has not been fully established.

Methods and analysis This is a prospective observational study conducted in a 47-bed mixed ICU of a tertiary academic teaching hospital. The study will be performed from January 2014 to December 2015. All patients meeting the diagnostic criteria of acute exacerbation of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and admitted to the ICU are potentially eligible for the present study. The relevant demographics and laboratory measurements have been obtained. Transthoracic echocardiography was performed immediately after ICU admission by experienced intensivists. The Cox proportional hazard regression model has been fitted by using a stepwise forward selection and backward elimination technique. If linear assumption is not satisfied, the linear spline function will be used.

Ethics and dissemination The study protocol was approved by the ethics committee of Jinhua municipal central hospital. The results will be published in a peer-reviewed journal and shared with the worldwide medical community.

Trial registration number The study protocol is registered at ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT02099279).