Building your Long Covid Assessment Pathway

I have been working as a specialist respiratory physiotherapist in the COPD, oxygen and pulmonary rehab  team for 18 years, when it first formed and I am now the team leader. In 2009 I completed a respiratory MSc, and  shortly after this the non-medical prescribing course. I have been a guest lecturer at the University of Essex for the BSc and MSc physiotherapy students since 2002. As my particular interest is pulmonary rehab I am involved in research with Cambridge University looking at increasing the numbers of patients attending the classes and I chair the East of England pulmonary rehab group. I have published research focused on pulmonary rehab and presented poster presentations at the British and European Thoracic Society conferences. In the last 6 months I have developed post covid rehab and I have led the long covid clinics in Mid and South Essex. 

Jo Steele is a Critical Care Rehabilitation Co-ordinator at the Royal Stoke University Hospital, Stoke-on-Trent. Her passion for caring and supporting critically ill patients and their families developed on placement during her nurse training at Staffordshire University.  Upon graduating as a Registered General Nurse Jo briefly worked on a Gastroenterology ward before commencing her Critical Care career in January 2005.

Throughout her career Jo has been motivated to ensure the provision of high quality, evidence-based patient care achieving a post-graduate degree in Adult Critical Care (Hons) at Keele University followed by a Clinical Diagnostics. Jo has always had a keen interest in rehabilitation within Critical Care, promoting patients independence and enabling patient and family involvement. Within her role as Practice Development Nurse Jo was able to combined her interests in facilitating the educational development of staff to ensure excellence in practice whilst promoting holistic patient-centred care prior to her appointment as Rehabilitation Coordinator.

Investment into a Rehabilitation after Critical Illness service at UHNM enabled Jo to gain her dream role, leading service development and implementation focussing on improving long term outcomes for critically ill patients and their families. Jo has shared her experiences at the British Association of Critical Care Nurses conference 2018 in Bournemouth and the Intensive Care Society State of the Art conference, London in December 2018. 

Furthermore in 2019 Jo explored the establishment of UHNM Critical Care Rehabilitation Service through both a co-authored article published in the Intensive Care Society Critical Eye magazine [January Edition] and the successful delivery of the first UHNM Critical Care Rehabilitation Conference in October [2019].  Whilst redeployments to bedside nursing, due to the COVID-19 pandemic limited planned innovation for 2020,  Jo and her colleagues set up a virtual Critical Care MDT post-COVID clinic pilot to assist with the identification of Post-Intensive Care Syndrome [PICS] and management of patients on-going rehabilitation needs.

Lucy Powell is a Rehabilitation Coordinator working in the Critical Care Unit at the Royal Stoke University Hospitals of North Midlands [UHNM] in Stoke-on- Trent. Following in the long line of nurses and allied health professionals in her family, Lucy qualified from the University of Birmingham as a Registered Adult Nurse [Hons] in 2006. Since then she has dedicated her career to the care and recovery of critically ill patients and their families. 

Lucy initially worked at Good Hope Hospital and the Heart of England NHS Trust where she completed her post-graduate certificate in Adult Critical Care Nursing, and through this she was able to experience other specialist Critical Care services in the West Midlands. It was also where her special interest in rehabilitation began and she learned about the profound issues for patients and their families after a prolonged Critical Care stay. To greater develop her understanding of the role of clinical leadership in the delivery of world-class patient services Lucy recently completed a Leadership & Management for Healthcare Professionals module at Keele University [Level 7]. 

Lucy moved to the Royal Stoke Critical Care Unit in 2014; a 34 bedded tertiary referral centre, with trauma, neurosurgical, stroke specialisms. In the lead up to her current role and as part of the departmental transformation program, Lucy was a key member of the team responsible for developing and delivering the implementation of the UHNM Critical Care Rehabilitation Service.  She spoke about this at the British Association of Critical Care Nurses [BACCN] Conference 2018 in Bournemouth and again at the Intensive Care Society State of the Art conference, London in December 2018. 

2019 was another busy year with an article published in the Intensive Care Society Critical Eye magazine exploring the establishment of UHNM Critical Care Rehabilitation Service [January Edition], as well as the successful delivery of the first UHNM Critical Care Rehabilitation Conference in October [2019]. Whilst 2020 did not take the path the team expected, with redeployments to bedside nursing due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Lucy and her colleagues set up a virtual Critical Care MDT post-COVID clinic pilot to assist with the identification of Post-Intensive Care Syndrome [PICS] and management of patients on-going rehabilitation needs.

Jane Clarke became The Bath & North East Somerset, Swindon and Wiltshire Long Covid Assessment Clinical Lead in December 2020. This is the first single point of access clinical service this emerging ICS has set up. Collaboration across the region has been paramount to its successful delivery. Jane was seconded from her MSK locality lead role in Wiltshire Health and Care. Jane’s experience working at nationally renowned Bath Centre for Pain Services ensured she had the skills to manage complex long term conditions including fatigue and the anxiety and distress this causes. She also runs her own private Physiotherapy practice, so is well practiced in developing a reputation, listening to what patients expect and need and forming a service that best fits this. The patients voice is a critical part in the Long Covid service development. When she is not thinking about Long Covid she will be outside with her dog Milly!

Dr Marc Kingsley is a consultant clinical psychologist and registered psychotherapist, and works at NELFT as the Strategic and Clinical Lead for Clinical Health Psychological Services.  Marc has worked in the NHS for the past 22 years in both mental health and physical health settings. His area of specialty is in clinical health psychology, which involves providing psychological care for patients and their families living with physical health conditions. Marc is deeply committed to the ongoing local and national development of Clinical Health Psychology, and in particular to the national aim to implement holistic health care, in which mental health is treated on a parity with physical health in all health settings.   This includes providing support and supervision to the development of psychological practice in the Long Covid recovery process.