Fit for the future: an optimistic view of respiratory care

If you care about the way the NHS Long Term Plan (LTP) and other recent developments will impact on your practice, or reshape future services, you will be interested in hearing the view of leading respiratory experts who will be speaking during the opening plenary of PCRS Respiratory Conference 2019.

The Government’s LTP published in January has excited respiratory leaders because respiratory care has been given a national focus for the first time.

The document highlights late diagnosis, variation in service provision, geographic and socio-economic inequalities, rising emergency admissions and poor international comparisons as challenges to be overcome.

Tackling chronic breathlessness and tobacco addiction for example feature significantly and represent a new way of thinking, something which PCRS has been campaigning on for some years.

Other recent developments that will affect future patient care are the the Five Year Plan for improving respiratory services, drawn up by the Taskforce for Lung Health, a coalition of respiratory organisations of which PCRS is a member and new guidelines for diagnosing and managing asthma and COPD.

Carol Stonham, PCRS Vice Chair Elect, will open the plenary, called Fit for the Future – optimising respiratory care, with an upbeat view of how respiratory care is likely to improve over the next ten years and how PCRS and delegates will be able to play a role in bringing about these changes in their localities.

This will set the scene for the overall tone of the conference which aims to inspire delegates to discover new ways of working with patients and colleagues, helping them to respond positively to the challenges of primary and community care. 

Carol will then open the session to an expert multidisciplinary panel who will discuss how the different professions see the primary care and community services respiratory picture in the future. The debate will focus on tobacco dependency, the patient experience and frailty. Delegates will have an opportunity to quiz the panel.

The panel comprises Dr Katherine Hickman, a GP and PCRS Executive Vice-Chair Elect, Deirdre Siddaway, a respiratory specialist nurse, Darush Attar-Zadeh, a pharmacist and PCRS Executive Committee member and Mike McKevitt, Director of Patient Services at the British Lung Foundation who will offer the patient perspective.

Carol says:  “The opening plenary will consider how we can capitalise on the NHS Long Term Plan and how we can use it as a lever to improve the care our respiratory patients experience at all areas where care is delivered. The challenge is how to make the plans a reality considering the pressure we are all under. This will be a time to reflect, question and plan the changes and consider how we influence for the future.”