Second Opinion.  Your respiratory questions answered… This question was posted by a PCRS-UK member and is answered by Dr Iain Small and Dr Vince Mak.

This guide provides an algorithm to identify people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) who might benefit from ICS treatment and those in whom it may not be appropriate, and an approach to withdrawing ICS in patients in whom it is not needed.   The gui

In this Chair's Perspective from the Spring 2017 edition of Primary Care Respiratory Update, Dr Noel Baxter discusses the importance of early and accurate diagnosis for respiratory conditions.

In this article from PCRU Spring 2017 Fran Robinson interviews Barbara Preston, a member of the PCRS Lay Reference Group, who had bronchiectasis as a child but was not diagnosed until she was an adult, the article illustrates how this delay to diagnosis impacts

The report reveals that:

It also reveals that the many cost-effective and high value ways to help treat and manage COPD, including providing flu jabs, supporting patients to live smoke free, and physical activity and supported self-management programmes, are under used.

Primary Care Respiratory Update produces a regular feature article where we explore how healthcare professionals can support self-management in a range of conditions.  These include:-  

In these two articles from the December 2017 issue of Primary Care Respiratory Update, Dr Andrew Whittamore (Asthma UK) and Mr Mike McKevitt (British Lung Foundation) discuss tools and services available to support self-management in long term respiratory conditions.

In this article published in the December 2017 issue of Primary Care Respiratory Update, Professors' Hilary Pinnock and Stephanie Taylor discuss the evidence for self-management and provide answers to the most common questions arising about what it is and how we as healthcare professionals can su

In this article from the December 2017 issue of Primary Care Respiratory Update, Alex Woodward discusses the development of a business case for, and implementation of, an integrated cardiac and pulmonary rehabilitation service; and outlines the outcomes and learning points.

Recommendations for primary care include:

More than two thirds of PCRS-UK members use the GOLD (Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease) guideline for the diagnosis, management and prevention of COPD, or a local variation of GOLD, as their management pathway for COPD, according to a survey conducted by PCRS-UK in June

This article introduces the TARGET study algorithm paper, which reports development of a new clinical prediction algorithm designed to improve targeted antibiotic prescribing in children with respiratory tract infections.

This centre-fold pull-out chart from the Spring 2017 issue of Primary Care Respiratory Update provides useful, succinct advice for healthcare professionals on appropriate tools to support respiratory diagnosis in primary care.

In this feature Getting the Basics Right article from the Spring 2017 issue of Primary Care Respiratory Update, Dr Duncan Keeley discusses the role of microspirometry and peak flow to support the diagnosis of respiratory conditions in primary care.