2010 News Archive

27 August 2010 - The British Lung Foundation, supported by the Department of Health, the National Institute for Health Research, Medical Research Council and the British Thoracic Society, is running a one-day workshop “Where Next in Asbestos Research: A Workshop” at the Wellcome Trust in London on 23 November 2010.
Click here for more information.

23 July 2010 - latest presentation on the National Strategy from Robert Winter available to view.

21 July 2010 - IMPRESS Guide to Information -  - to accompany the guide to medicines use information already available.  A practical guide for clinicians and commissioners about data and information related to respiratory care: what is there, why would you use it, where to find it, and pros and cons. It brings together sources from the NHS, commercial and voluntary sectors and across primary, secondary and community care. Click here.

16 July 2010 - set of web-based resources to support primary care implementation of the national strategy in England from PCRS-UK : the PCRS-UK Quick Reference Guide. 

15 July 2010 - Equity and Excellence: Liberating the NHS.  The new white paper on the NHS in England was released on 12 July.  Until details are available about the outcomes framework, the 150 quality standards, or other details that specifically affect the provision of respiratory care, IMPRESS will not add commentary to what is already available from other policy analysts.  However, the white paper and briefings  are all available here.

15 July 2010 IMPRESS recommends a number of discussion papers issued just before the white paper (see above). 

Two on health and social care integration: (more...)
NHS  Confederation PCT Network briefing in association with Directors of Adult Social Services: Where next for health and social care integration?

Paper from Chris Ham on progress in health and social care integration, focusing on Birmingham, Torbay and Northumbria.
 

Reorganisation and QIPP
The triumph of hope over experience: Lessons from the history of reorganisation from Nigel Edwards, NHS Confederation 

Dealing with the downturn: using the evidence - from Nigel Edwards, NHS Confederation, including a useful economic analysis about what is needed to release cash with services such as hospital at home.
(more...)

Emergency admissions (more...)
The Nuffield Trust has published a briefing: Trends in emergency admissions in England 2004–2009: is greater efficiency breeding inefficiency?  Thirty-five per cent of all admissions in the NHS in England are classified as emergency admissions, costing approximately £11 billion a year.  This paper examines the 11.8% rise in emergency hospital admissions in England from 2004/05 to 2008/09 and tries to identify the possible explanations. 

Quality Standards
NICE has now published its first quality standards  for stroke, dementia and venous thromboembolism (VTE) prevention.

15 July 2010 - European Federation of Allergy and Airway Diseases Patients Association (EFA)  has launched the EFA Book on Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease in Europe.Sharing and Caring full of facts and figures and a call to action.

7 July 2010 - New publication from IMPRESS: Guide to information about the use of medicines in the NHS. A document about the information available to help clinicians, commissioners and managers to know what is being prescribed by whom, for whom, at what cost, and at what benefit. It is written as a companion guide to the IMPRESS guide to information due out by 15 July.

1 July 2010 - New publication from IMPRESS - More for Less.  Click here for more.

23 June 2010 Two complementary documents have been launched on GP commissioning.  Giving GPs budgets for commissioning: what needs to be done? A discussion paper  comes from 6 influential policy organisations: NHS Alliance, Nuffield Trust, Kings Fund, RCGP, NAPC, NHS Confederation  and Developing GP Commissioning - a new form of local clinically led and empowered commissioning from the NHS Alliance.  Go here for more information.

21 June 2010 The DH has issued a revised operating framework for the NHS in England for the remainder of 2010/11. It heralds more substantive changes to the Framework for 2011/12 where indicators  will be removed that have "little or no clinical relevance."   Go here for more.

18 June 2010 - new dates announced for autumn meetings on the Strategy for COPD in England Partnership Working to Implement the COPD Strategy at a Local Level.  Go here to find out more and register. 

14 June 2010 - Lung Improvement pilots in each region announced. Click here for more information.

11 June 2010 - advance warning that IMPRESS guides to using information and More for Less - Discussion paper to inform the implementation of respiratory strategies within the context of limited resources with many practical examples are due out shortly.  Subscribe to IMPRESS RSS feed to be alerted when they are ready.

11 June 2010 the widely reported McKinsey March report to the DH about Achieving World Class Productivity in the NHS 2009/10 – 2013/14: Detailing the Size of the Opportunity is now available as a ppt  set of over 120 slides with facts and figures and forecasts to download.

11 June 2010 New toolkit to help clinicians involved in lung cancer care to engage with their local commissioners and make the case for improvements in lung cancer services published by the UK Lung Cancer Coalition.  

8 June 2010 - First speech by new Secretary of State for Health, Andrew Lansley, with focus on patient safety - more information for patients, restatement of the "nothing about me without me" principle, and if a patient is readmitted within  30 days the hospital will not receive any additional payment for the additional treatment.

28 May 2010 - Living and dying with COPD - we are proud to announce that  "The development of an educational package for clinicians involved in end of life care issues in COPD" has been accepted for oral presentation at the European Respiratory Society meeting in Barcelona in September 2010.  Click here for more information about Living and Dying.  Note that following testing in Bristol and Crewe, and updates such as new GMC guidance that comes into effect on 1 July 2010 (see Jargon Buster End of Life entry), the pack is being revised and will be relaunched in the autumn.  Some copies of the existing materials are still available.

27 May 2010 - Pulmonary rehabilitation page and Personalising Care page updated.

27 May 2010 - Total Place entry in Jargon Buster

23 April 2010 - thought provoking slides on competition, integration, improvement and public sector spending from the Nuffield Trust Summit 2010. Click here for slides. 

12 April 2010 - Pilots announced for National Strategy in England.  Proformas submitted by 30 April; decision by 17 May for year-long pilots. See here for more information.

1 April 2010 A new online tool for effective patient and public engagement in health from Picker Institute Europe commissioned by the Department of Health in England. Click here.

31 March 2010  - White paper on future of care launched.  See here.  Our response to the Green Paper consultation highlighting good practice across health and social care interface and explaining some of the challenges in respiratory care.   Also useful: IMPRESS Social care and housing Jargon Buster.

24 March 2010  New evidence on networks and communities of practice

IMPORTANT!  23 February 2010 - Consultation on a Strategy for Services for Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) in England  launched with six week consultation period. Both BTS and PCRS-UK submitted responses on behalf of their members.   Slides from all events can be found here.

22 February 2010 - A smokefree future: a comprehensive tobacco control strategy for England - summary and useful table showing respiratory deaths attributable to smoking.

5 February 2010 - Consultation on Services for COPD in England and plans for implementation
The Department of Health, in partnership with the 10 SHAs in England and NHS Improvement and supported by BTS, PCRS-UK, BLF and AUK, is holding a series of regional events for healthcare professionals to hear more about the content of the Strategy and to feed back views. To find out more, and to reserve a place please look here.

3 February 2010 - Personalised care planning - new information

IMPORTANT!   2 February 2010 Your ideas and experience required
We are asking for your clinical help in producing ideas and examples of changes made in your locality that have made a difference. Click here for further details

19 January 2010 updates on national strategies including  DH England Strategy From Good to Great, and Operating Framework for England.

Good practice pages updated.

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10 December 2009  Joint Respiratory National Clinical Directors appointed,  Lung Improvement Programme launched in England and calls for examples of good practice in asthma and COPD. More

8 December 2009: free spaces still available on the national training workshop for the Living and Dying programme February 4th and 5th 2010 in Manchester.  Click here for more information.   WAITING LIST NOW IN OPERATION (Jan 2010).

3 December - IMPRESS Award announced Displaying Innovation in Integrated Primary and Secondary Respiratory Care.  More

13 November 2009 IMPRESS responds to the Big Care Debate. The Green Paper Shaping the Future of Care Together sets out a vision for a new care and support system. IMPRESS responded to the consultation, with advice from DH Long Term Conditions Delivery Support Team.

23 October 2009 - update on procurement and do's and don'ts of procurement

October 2009 - updates on commissioning - World Class Commissioning adds competency 11: Ensuring efficiency and effectiveness of spend and competency 6 requires priortisation of investment in line with different financial scenarios

October 2009 - New pages added on networks and spirometry!

September 2009 - IMPRESS responds to the Health Select Committee Inquiry into Commissioning

11 Sept - see the SEESAW report,  Shifting the Balance of Healthcare to Local Settings from the King's Fund. Tony Davison, who attended, says clnicians should take note of its key messages. For further information see here.

11 Sept - 2 articles in the BMJ on the impact of Payment by results are highlighted in the Jargon Buster: see Jargon Buster "Tariff".

4 Sept - DH England has issued a short film capturing the range of perspectives from some of the 16 Integrated Care Pilots (ICP).  See www.youtube.com/wcccomms

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December 2009 Respiratory National Clinical Directors appointed and Lung Improvement Programme launched in England

We are delighted to announce the appointment of joint National Clinical Directors for respiratory disease in England. Their role will be to raise awareness of respiratory disease, and to oversee and steer the improvement of respiratory services in the NHS, with a particular focus on COPD, asthma, home oxygen and sleep apnoea. Professor Sue Hill, Chief Scientific Officer in the Department of Health and Dr Robert Winter, Chest Physician at Addenbrookes, and East of England SHA Medical Director, have been appointed to these important roles.

This means that respiratory disease now has national clinical directors sitting alongside those for cancer, CHD, diabetes, children’s health and mental health, championing the cause of respiratory disease at the highest levels in the NHS.

To see the DH press release, click here

A new NHS Lung Improvement Programme has also been launched by NHS Improvement to support the development of clinical networks and the implementation of the forthcoming National Strategy for COPD.  Its Lung Improvement team will support respiratory leads in the SHAs, the development of Respiratory Networks, and pilot programmes to improve the management of respiratory disease. It will build on the successes of existing national improvement programmes in Cancer, Cardiac, Diagnostics and Stroke services. The Lung Improvement Programme aims to support clinical teams, commissioners, service managers and other key stakeholders deliver effective clinical practice through process improvement and redesign. They have set up a Lung Improvement page here.

IMPRESS will work with LIP to share examples of good practice, and to support the development of local networks. 

 

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Lung Improvement Programme (LIP) and NHS Evidence
From January 2010 the Lung Improvement Programme (LIP) will be conducting a search for examples that "promote high standards in efficiency and effectiveness, as well as providing good quality integrated care across all stages of severity and have clearly measurable outcomes against a robust baseline of activity" in COPD and asthma.  There are proformas available here for COPD and home oxygen and asthma.  LIP requests a covering email giving permission for the example to be shared across the NHS.   Where appropriate, examples will be shared with the Department of Health which is supporting the collection of specific examples of good practice to be published on the NHS Evidence web-site.    First deadline: 29 January 2010
 

For more information on good practice  go to good practice examples.

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IMPRESS Award December 2009

The IMPRESS Award for Innovation in Integrated Primary and Secondary Respiratory Care is supported by the joint partners in IMPRESS, BTS and PCRS UK, with the aim of acknowledging and celebrating excellence in respiratory healthcare.  The joint sponsorship arrangement reflects the aims of the IMPRESS project:-

 "providing the clinical leadership required to drive high quality patient centred care across the traditional boundaries of secondary and primary care to integrate and improve the services for people with respiratory disease".

The 2009 IMPRESS Award
The 2009 IMPRESS Award was presented at the 2009 BTS Winter Meeting:
 

2009 Award Winners
COPD Patient Pathway Project
Guy’s and St Thomas’ & Kings Charities
Guy’s and St Thomas’ and Kings College NHS Foundation Trusts
Lambeth & Southwark Primary Care Trusts

2009 Special Commendation
The South East Essex Model for Integrated COPD Care
Southend University Hospital
South East Essex PCT
Audley Mills Surgery
School of Health and Human Sciences, University of Essex
Southend Breathe Easy 

A link will also be provided on the good practice pages to both these and to the 2008 winner Salford PCT and Salford Royal Foundation Trust Salford’s Integrated COPD Service and to the 2008 Special Commendation from Solihull Care Trust and Solihull Hospital, Heart of England Acute Trust Patient Focused Integrated Respiratory Care

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Background information to the IMPRESS Award July 2009

Displaying Innovation in Integrated Primary and Secondary Respiratory Care – The 2009 IMPRESS Award

"providing the clinical leadership required to drive high quality patient centred care across the traditional boundaries of secondary and primary care to integrate and improve the services for people with respiratory disease".

Integration of primary and secondary care is a core theme and all submissions should demonstrate how their initiative has contributed to integrated care.   Initiatives which address the following sub-themes are particularly welcome:

•  New ways of working, and/or development of new professional roles, in primary, secondary or intermediate care
• Integration with social care
• Promoting patient choice about where they receive their care
• Provision of a truly patient-centred service
• Offering support for those with long-term respiratory conditions

HOW TO APPLY
The deadline is Monday 21 September 2009.
 
Applications are invited from teams and units rather than individuals. Applications should be sent by email to no later than 21 September 2009. Please mark your email “IMPRESS Award 2009”
 
The application should contain the following information:

• Names and positions of all members of the team
• Name and email address of contact person
• Institution/Organisation name and address
• Title of the service/initiative
• Details of the service/initiative that has been developed including the reasons for the development of the service/initiative, methods used,  outcome/results and future plans.

Applications should be no more than 2 A4sides with up to one figure/illustration.

A supporting statement from an appropriate Medical Director/Clinical Director or equivalent principal should be included at the end of the application or as a covering note.
 
The selection panel will comprise members of the IMPRESS Committee who will look for evidence that patients have been involved in development of the initiative.
 
The Award will be presented during the President’s Reception in the evening of Thursday 3 December 2009, during the BTS Winter Meeting.   Applicants will be notified of the results in early November and will be expected to attend to receive the award if successful.

 

Enquiries:

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2009

20 July - two new presentations added from Summer BTS meeting: How to win friends and influence people: how to use data and relationship building to achieve change in services, particularly primary care from the Salford team of June Roberts, Dr N Diar Bakerly and Anna Thompson, and  Advice to NHS providers (focusing on community providers)  about how to work with commissioners successfully from Sharon Haggerty  from NHS Darlington.

18 June -  IMPRESS  conference webcasts now available here.

18 June - two new documents from the NHS  recommended by IMPRESS: Junior Doctor Guide to the NHS and Public and Patient Engagement.

9 June 2009 Acorn Awards. Please consider applying for the NHS Alliance Acorn Awards to demonstrate how respiratory care can be improved. For more details click here.

6 June 2009 The 2009 IMPRESS Award – Displaying Innovation in Integrated Primary and Secondary Respiratory Care. Applications are invited from teams and units rather than individuals. Further details can be found here

March 2009

Service Specification for Investigation and treatment of Obstructive Sleep Apnoea Syndrome

OSAS is a very common condition with a major impact on health and society, but its importance has been recognised belatedly and services for the investigation and treatment of affected individuals in the UK have developed slowly and patchily. This document explains the nature of the condition, its impact on health and social functioning, the principles and details of investigation and treatment and the requirements for long term support and management.

This service specification represents the views and recommendations of the British Thoracic Society (BTS), Association for Respiratory Technology and Physiology (ARTP), General Practice Airways Group (GPIAG) and the Sleep Apnoea Trust Association (SATA). We hope that it will help to achieve improvements in the availability of services and in the quality of care for individuals with OSAS.

A copy of this document can be downloaded here

2008

Dec 11 2008: NHS England Operating Framework published including details of PCT allocations, priorities for the next two years 2009/2011, the Vital Signs framework, the framework for CQUINs (see Jargon Buster for new terms) and the standard NHS contracts for acute, ambulance and community services.

4 December 2008: an 18-week breathlessness pathway (for obstructive lung disease) has been launched. Click here. This will provide opportunities for commissioners and clinicians to work together as part of a well-established pathway programme.   IMPRESS will discuss what it might need to do to support its implementation.

IMPRESS presented a session at the NHS Confederation's PCT Network Conference World Class Commissioning, World Class Health on 22 January 2009 at the Building Design Centre, London. Click here for presentations.

National COPD Audit 2008. The findings were released on 19 November 2008. The participation rate in acute trusts was an incredible 98%. Data were collected about general aspects of COPD care and specific Quality Indicators for COPD services, namely: non-invasive ventilation (NIV), pulmonary rehabilitation (PR), early discharge schemes (EDS) and oxygen services. Also, information about palliative care services for people with COPD was collected.  Click here for the summary report and here for more information.

 Living and Dying with COPD is an educational package from IMPRESS consisting of a DVD and CD of PowerPoint slides. Copies is now available. For further information click and to order a copy click here.

October 17 2008
lntegrated care pilots (primary and community clinician-led and PCT endorsed pilots): the final prospectus and evidence base review are now online.  If you are aware of any respiratory proposals, do let us know.

16 July
New Department of Health End of Life Care Strategy – promoting high quality care for all adults at the end of life launched. This highlights communication skills deficits – starting the conversation – which IMPRESS has already picked up for COPD and will address  in its communication educational resources that are currently in production.

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3 July
As part of Next Stage Review Primary and Community Care Strategy launched including plans for pilot integrated care organisations.

IMPRESS has joined forces with The NHS Alliance, Association of British Clinical Diabetologists, British Geriatrics Society, British Society for Rheumatology, Primary Care Cardiovascular Society and Society for Endocrinology to respond to the Next Stage Review and its proposals for integrated healthcare: Integrated Healthcare: from aspiration to implementation.

For the report click here

Please note that we have heard that the Department of Health will be testing and evaluating new ways in which PCTs can commission more integrated services from innovative groups of clinicians. We expect this to be a tight timescale, and you are advised to have proposals ready by early September: 

“We are inviting proposals for pilots that involve clinicians working on a more collaborative bases across primary, community and secondary care – with local authorities and other sectors, including social care – to achieve more personal, responsive care and better outcomes for a local population.

The pilots will be based on the registered patient lists for groups of GP practices, and will be joint proposals from groups of primary and community clinicians with local authorities to provide integrated health and social care services."

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30 June 2008
The review of the NHS by Lord Darzi is published: High Quality Care For All: NSR final report launched.
Cick here.  

It is accompanied by NHS Next Stage Review: A Quality Workforce. 
Click here

For a summary of the  Review by IMPRESS Project Manager, Siân Williams, go to the Policy page.

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25 June 2008
New IMPRESS COMMISSIONING A COMMUNITY COPD SERVICE: LESSONS FOR THE NHS
Based on a case study in Somerset PCT including dos and don'ts of procurement.  
Click here

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18 June 2008
Respiratory HRG version 4.3 is now available for quick reference.  
See Jargon Buster Appendix 2.

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3 June 2008
In conjunction with the launch by the Department of Health of Primary Care Trust Procurement Guide for Health Services IMPRESS has published its dos and don’ts of procurement as part of its paper Commissioning a community COPD service: Lessons for the NHS based on a case study in Somerset PCT.  See our commissioning page.  It will be followed by a fuller account of a case study from Somerset PCT about procurement of a COPD service  (see 25 June).

We have also become aware of the lack of convergence between the evidence bases used by some commissioners, and that used by clinicians for decision-making. We are therefore reviewing how best to ensure that evidence from BTS and GPIAG conferences and publications gets into the domain of managers and commissioners.  Equally, we are scanning the NHS websites for information about new service models in respiratory care, to ensure that the evidence from these is shared across the clinical community.