#nhs #covid19 #health #seminar #respiratory #rochdale #unitedkingdom #vacine #breathing #doctor #wellbeing
Keeping this introduce and thank you thank you sir you’ve just promoted me I’m I’m not the CEO of NCA um but I am the chief officer for rale Care Organization that uh covers Rockell infirmary and all of the Community Health Services in the town so
I just want to start by saying thanks to sah for asking me to come back and open the event today um this is the second event uh the first one was just brought Christmas on Diabetes today’s events all about keeping well uh in winter so looking at winter winter illnesses and
I’ll introduce some speakers in a minute I just wanted to firstly say thank you for coming out tonight it’s really treacherous out there um and it’s very very cold so thank you for taking the time to get dressed up warm and and come over to to the community center really
Really appreciate it um couple of things different from the last time when we met uh you’ll see the camera we we’re being videoed and I believe this is going to go on YouTube um for people to watch at a later date so that that’s fabulous that we can get the messages out today
To a much wider audience so uh thank you for for putting the effort in and arranging all this and to the chat there that’s uh managing the camera brilliant okay um one of the roles I’ve got is uh chief officer for what something called the local Care Organization now that is
An organization that brings together all of the Health and Care providers across the B of Rockdale so that includes primary care so your GPS uh mental health services so panine Care staff local Authority staff of social workers alongside Hospital doctors and community staff with our community and volun sector as well and
One of the key aims that we have is to look at health promotion and and health protection how do we uh work with communities to look at how to make better decisions how to have a more healthy lifestyle um and and and you know trying to invest really Upstream in
In keeping people well and healthy and part of today’s discussion hopefully in presentation is going to cover some of that the other thing that we are Keen to do is get into communities to speak to communities and get our commissions uh alongside local people and local communities talking about things that of
Concern to them um and and engaging in communities in a way that’s meaningful and has added value um and I think today’s event is a really good example of of just that and thank you to sah and Tariq and other people that really do put the effort in to Bringing people
Together uh and arranging for you know people from uh Healthcare to come and talk tonight is is really really exceptional and uh I think they they at some point in the proceedings today deserve a round of applause so I’ll prop start right now so we just have a quick
Round of Applause for Tariq and the team we’re supported again tonight as we were last time by jeans for health at the back there and I would really encourage you to go over have a chat find out what that’s about and get involved it’s a really important piece
Of research uh and um and we just thank you again for for supporting the event tonight and for living wellth living well is our our local uh health and wellbeing offer for Rockdale they you know are you know fastidious in in turning up at every single event that
They’re all here uh really committed to the work that they do so again they here tonight wanted to talk about cholesterol and want to talk about blood pressure so again if you get the opportunity of of of a dinner later please find the time to go and have a chat with the team
There that they really appreciate it so to to the big events we’ve got two speakers this evening we’ve got Dr Ruth Wiggins who’s a respiratory consultant working out m m General who’s going to talk to you tonight about winter books winter winter respir conditions and then
Following WTH we have got where is he uh here we have uh we’ve got Chris Dalton who’s uh the lead is a physiotherapist by trade but the lead for something we call the enhanced respiratory service in not sale uh just been recently accredited so a really high uh highly
Well regarded service and Chris and the team and a number of the team in the room this evening are going to talk to you about long Co and maybe make a a bit of a plug for some other services that the uh the team offer as well so uh that
I’m looking forward to that so I’m going to hand over now to Ruth who’s going to take us through the slide deck and and then hopefully uh some questions and answers and then on to Chris thank you very much [Applause] okay um do I need to be in the middle so
That you can see me yeah okay right move so hi everyone I’m Ruth I’m a consultant at North Manchester I grew up in Rochdale it’s lovely to be back here and and thank you so much for inviting me to come and talk to you about respiratory viruses so um Steve just mentioned
Mentioned that Chris and the rest of the long Co team are going to be talking after me so thank you so much for coming guys I really really appreciate it we’ve also got two doctors in the room so Dr Müller and Dr khah over here who are
Here to help and talk to you and help to translate so if there’s anything that you don’t understand that I’m talking about I’m sorry my urder is terrible so please they will hopefully be able to help explain a little bit to you so if you want um to ask any medical questions
Please ask me you can ask one of them um are you going to read next slide please oh gosh right it’s like Chris Wy um so I wanted to kind of try and think about what you guys might want to learn from this event so really just to talk about
What um types of infections cause respiratory kind of viral infections what is a virus how do you get a virus who is at risk of viral infections and what kind of symptoms do you get if you have a virus and what happens Can it can
It be a serious thing um what do you need to do if you have a viral infection and how can you protect yourself from viral infections and then as we’ve already said we’re going to talk a little bit about long covid what the what the definition is of long covid and
What you can do if you do have symptoms of long covid and how Som how we might be able to help you so infections so infe s are caused by germs and germs are um can be lots of different things so there are lots of different things that
Are germs so bacteria are germs viruses are germs fungi are germs parasites things like ticks or mosquitoes or worms those would all be counted as germs and and there are millions of germs and we encounter germs all the time not all germs are bad germs live on
Our body they live inside our bodies and and they don’t always cause us to become unwell but when a germ enters the body and it multiplies and it causes a reaction in your body that’s what we call an infection and and that’s when we can become more unwell thanks Chris so viruses so
Viruses are a type of germ and viruses infect a living thing so that that thing is called a host and they can’t replicate on their own viruses so they have to infect something which is called a host and then they have to turn their cells over use that body that that host
Cell to make more viruses so they basically they hijack the normal things in our cells the the bits of our cells that we use to repair our own cells they hijack that normal machinery and they use use it to make more viruses so when a virus infects a cell it hijacks your
Normal cell machinery and eventually the the viruses will break out of the cell and they will kill that cell that’s something called Lis and when that happens that means more virus can spill out into your body it can cause more of an infection but it also causes a reaction in your body and
Things like little proteins and chemicals and things are released and that can cause problems so the other thing about viruses which is very specific is that when a virus in invades a cell and it uses the cell Machinery to make more virus um there it can it can do does
That very quickly and when it does it very quickly there can be faults in how that virus does that so the virus us might make have a different spelling in the sentence of its DNA and that’s that can cause the virus to change so viruses change very very frequently and very
Very quickly that’s a process called mutation so that’s something that’s very particular to viruses another thing that’s very important to know about viruses is they are not the same as bacteria so they they they work in a different way so antibi iotic medicines that you might
Ask for or think that you need or take for an infection will not work against a viral infection so antibiotics do not work for viruses okay so the common winter viruses so the things that I’m mainly going to talk to you about today are these three things so there’s there’s a
Virus called covid also called Corona virus or covid-19 that you’ve probably all heard of there’s a virus called flu which is also called influenza and then there’s another virus which I’m just going to mention which is called respiratory sensial virus so those three viruses are all very common
In Winter and they cause a lot of winter infections um they’re all respiratory viruses gen generally so they tend to cause problems in the Airways in your nose in your throat in your eyes might cause some headaches and kind of flowy symptoms muscle aches and things like
That or you might get more of a chest problem so a cough or breathlessness or wheeziness it’s there are other common infections in the winter time so things like Nora virus that’s not a very nice infection um which causes diarrhea and vomiting and lots of infections tend to
Be common in the winter time but I’m just going to talk really about those three so there’s a dead there’s a very short video here which just says about how you catch a virus well you’ll have to open YouTube because it wasn’t working before really um so just going to see if this
Works so this video is just a quick video of explaining how viruses get Caught when we breathe talk laugh cough or sneeze we release droplets into the air some of these are microscopic and can remain floating in the air for an hour or more others are large fly through the air briefly and fall to the ground or other surfaces within seconds
If a person is infected with the virus some of the droplets may contain viruses the droplets also contain large amounts of salts and proteins and other chemicals that are in respiratory fluid if the air is not very hum some or all of the water in the droplet will evaporate leaving behind a smaller
Droplet that is about half the original size from research on flu patients we know that at least half of the viruses that are expelled into Airborne droplets are found in those smaller than five microns which can remain floating in air for half an hour or more during this
Period they may be carried by air currents many meters from the person who released them but this process also delut them in the air reducing the chance that you could breathe in a lot of them viruses and droplets that land on surfaces and in the microscopic ones
That float in air break down over time and lose their ability to cause infections how fast this happens depends on the type of virus and conditions such as temperature humidity and the type of surface material whether it’s cloth paper plastic or metal there are a lot of things we still
Don’t know about viruses in the air we don’t know how much transmission occurs through inhalation of such viruses versus them Landing in our eyes nostrils or mouth touching them objects for most types of viruses we don’t know how many are found in different size roets and how well the viruses survive under
Different conditions in the real World what is clear is that for some types of respiratory viruses transmission and close range can occur through multiple roofs including direct spray of large brets on to the body and in colation of microscopic Droplets so hopefully that clarifies a little bit how we get viruses although I think it’s fair to say that we probably don’t know a lot still about how viruses are transmitted YouTube still and um a lot of the kind of controversies around viruses in covid um were related to not
Understanding a lot about how viruses are transmitted so thanks for sorry coming back to the middle might have to skip again thank you so who is at risk from Winter viruses so we’ve talked about some of the common things now it’s important to know who is at risk of getting these
Illnesses so I think it’s fair to say that anybody can get a virus and we all have viruses and it’s very very common for us to get viral infections and especially if you live with small children or you have a lot of contact with children you will know that you
Will be frequently getting kind of things like colds and sniffles and sore throats but there are some groups of people who are at a higher risk of becoming more unwell with viruses so there are some things that are physical factors that mean that we’re at higher
Risk of viruses so that’s people who are very young so under the age of five or older over the age of 65 people who have other health problems in particular people who have lung problems like COPD and Asthma people who have heart problems like you might have
Had a heart attack or have heart failure if you’ve ever had a stroke if you have diabetes pregnant women are at risk of viral infections too people who have cognitive impairment people who have reduced Mobility or are not as mobile or who have a history of falling so those are the physical things
That might increase your risk of having viral infections but there are also some things in our environment that might increase your risk of getting a virus and becoming more unwell with a virus so if your home is cold or if it’s damp if you don’t have enough
Heating if you don’t have anywhere to live or you sleep outside if you have a poor diet if you smoke or you live in a house with somebody who smokes and some people who work in certain jobs are at risk of viral infections so if you work in health care
Or social care or if you work in another job like you’re a teacher or you work in a job where you’re um encountering a lot of people in a in a confined space we tend to see a higher risk of viral infections and from South Asian
Communities we know that there are a lot of people in the community who have things like health problems that might pre- dispose them make them have a higher risk of becoming more unwell with a virus like flu or covid thanks Chris so what symptoms the viruses caused we’ve talked a little bit
About this already um it’s it you will have all had viruses so you’ll know that the common things are things like itg eyes or a runny nose or a sore throat you might feel a bit tired or bit run down some people might have a cough you might have a temperature you might
Have a headache but if you’ve ever had a really bad flu or covid really serious covid then you might have a very high temperature you might have sickness you might um not be a to eat you might lose weight you might have muscle aches or feel extremely fatigued feel very very
Tired and these symptoms can go on for for several days even weeks with covid there are some specific symptoms and I’m sure the on Co team might talk about them in a bit more detail but there are some things that we know with covid like you might have lost your sense of taste
Or smell if you’ve ever had Co so can viral infections be serious so I think most viral infections are very mild and most people get better without any treatment at all but for some people they can become very unwell With viral infections and sometimes viruses can cause a condition called pneumonia so
Pneumonia means we can see a patch of infection on an X-ray that’s what a pneumonia means so if you become very unwell with viruses then you might need to come to hospital sometimes if you’re very unwell people need to be supported with their with breathing they might
Need a ventilator in intensive care and sometimes people can die from viral infections and one of the reasons that we worry about viruses is because they’re so common that even though most people get better with viruses because they are so common the number of people who come to hospital with viral
Infections is still quite high so the other thing to say about Co is that we know that some people who have covid may have symptoms for many many months after they become unwell with their covid infection so that’s another potentially serious thing that can happen to people
After they’ve had a virus um at the moment about 3% of people in the whole of the population of England and Scotland have covid about 10% of people in the whole of the population have flu and about 5% have this other virus called RSV so that’s quite a lot of
People so that means that you’re likely to have contacts with people who have these infections so H how has covid impacted South Asian communities in the UK I think it’s important to say that the pandemic didn’t affect all parts of the population equally and we know that people who were from South Asian
Communities had more infections they were more likely to become unwell and they were more likely to die unfortunately of covid and you may well have had friends or relatives who who died because of covid um and there are lots of reasons for this are some reasons like I’ve explained because of
The risks of becoming unwell with a virus there are some reasons about um uh living with lots of people in a house that would increase your risk of getting the virus the types of work that people do and also Access to Health Care um vaccination um uh and kind of other
Reasons why people may not have received equal treatment who from a South Asian background um and there are other things that have impacted the community disproportionately in a different way than other um ethnic groups in the UK so there is evidence to say that people’s mental health if you’re from a South
Asian Community might have been made worse by covid and also things like physical health so through not being able to speak to your doctor or not having regular checkups or or having um to wait a long time to be seen and other things like that so what should you do if you become
Unwell with the virus so my dad has helpfully managed to fix these which I bought off Amazon today so I’m going to give you them and pass them around so this is an oxygen meter so you can put this on your finger and check what your oxygen levels are
You just press the button here and it tells you what your oxygen levels are so it should be something between 94 and or above anything above 94 is okay so we sometimes use these to decide how poorly somebody is and I’m sure Chris remembers that when we were discharging people from the hospital
With covid we used to give people these and see how their oxygen were so I’ve said this a number of times but most people who have a virus have mild symptoms so if you’ve just got a bit of a cough or a headache or a low temperature then we would suggest that
You take lots of fluid so at least six to eight glasses of water a day you can use normal pain medicines like paracetamol or ibuprofen for your temperature if if you are in an at risk group for covid then we would the the advice is
Still that you should do a test a covid test and then you can speak to your GP or phone 119 which is the vaccine helpl line because you might be able to access some treatment for Co so there are some very particular treatments not antibiotics but a bit like that for
Covid and there are also treatments for influenza um which again if you are in an at risk group you would be able to get so if you’re in one of those groups that I was telling you about before you’ve got health conditions you’re over the age of 65 you’re pregnant we would
Usually suggest that you speak to a health care professional even if you’ve only got mild symptoms because you might be able to get some treatment if you were getting worse so your symptoms had not been getting better they were going on for days and days you’re coughing up when you’ve got
A higher temperature you can’t eat and drink it’s really important to make sure that somebody’s checking up on you if you live on your own or if you know somebody’s in this position and they live on their own just to check up on them you can speak to your Pharmacists
And they might be able to help with some other medicines and also you could make an appointment with your GP but if you’re becoming a lot more unwell so you’re very breathless even when you’re resting you’re finding it difficult to take a deep breath in you’ve got chest pain if you look you’re
Cold you’re clammy your skin is changing a different color your lips or your face are blue if anybody’s um they they’re not behaving normally so their behavior has changed or they’re more sleepy than usual that is an emergency and we would always suggest that you speak to a healthc care professional as an
Emergency so call 111 or call 999 or come to aing because you could have a very serious viral infection so what can we do to protect against viruses so I’m so glad they’ve put these um posters up at the back so deeplish Community Center is a warm space so there are spaces within
Rochdale that you can go to where Community spaces where you can keep warm you can have a cup of tea um you can seek advice about Heating and about bills energy bills and things like that so that is really really important and I would really encourage you to speak to
The people from the center if you’re worried about anything like that making sure that you’re drinking in a fluid carry on staying active if you can and even if that’s just up and about making a cup of tea or going upstairs to the toilet that’s really that all little
Bits are helpful and if you can or anybody in your house stop smokes then stop smoking because we know that that can increase your risk of getting a virus um to try and reduce the spread of viruses you can wash your hands Reg regly cover your face if you’re coughing
Or sneezing and if you know somebody is at risk of becoming unwell with a virus then and you have a virus you can maybe try and avoid seeing them if you can for a few days until you’re feeling better and you can prepare to have viruses because you know that it’s very common
So you can have simple medicines in your medicines cabinet and make sure that all of your medicines that you’re supposed to take from your Pharmacy sister all up to date but probably the the main thing that you can do to reduce the risk of becoming unwell with a virus is to have a
Vaccine so we’re just going to talk very briefly about that there’s a super quick video again about vaccines thanks Chris work the covid-19 vaccines work just like any other vaccine you may have had vaccines train our immune system to make antibodies and cells to fight the infection the vaccine does not contain
Covid-19 and cannot give you the virus the vaccines do not contain anything that has come from Petes or animals the vaccine does contain a minimal amount of ethol but less than you would find in the banana slice of bread so they are suitable for those who wish to avoid
Consuming animal products or alcohol because of religious cultural or Diet reasons more and more religious leaders and organizations are encouraging people of Faith to get the vaccine you can find the list of ingredients in the approved vaccine on the NH website for the facts on the ashco vaccine visit www. ./
Coronavirus so that’s a bit of specific information about the covid vaccine but in general the principle is the same vaccines often contain bits of the virus or bits of the virus that we’re trying to vaccinate against and they when they are putting your body they create a
Response in your body an immune response and that means that if you then get exposed to the virus in real life your body already has some memory of that virus so it’s better able to fight the virus off so should you get a covid or a
Fleu vaccine so these are the people who are currently recommended to get a vaccine for covid and flu and it’s you’ll notice that it’s a lot of this save people who are at risk of becoming seriously unwell with these viruses so if you’re over the age of 65 if you’ve
Got a health problem if you’re pregnant if you work in a highrisk job like you work in health or social care if you’re a carer if you live in a care home or if you you are somebody who has an underactive immune system or you live with somebody who has an underactive
Immune system so if you if if you fall into any one of these categories then we would recommend that you get a vaccine for covid and the flu children are also eligible for the flu vaccine as well so all School AG children from reception to year 11 are offered a flu vaccine and
Children age two to three are also offered a flu vaccine and then there are other children who are slightly outside of those age ranges if they have certain health conditions who also offer a flu vaccine so the there are slightly different rules for children and flu vaccines but they should all hopefully
If you if you have children or grandchildren have been offered a fle vaccine through school so is the vaccine going to make you unwar so it’s it’s quite common to feel a bit poorly after you’ve had a vaccine so common symptoms to get after you’ve had a vaccine are you feel uh or
Arm where the needle goes into your arm you can feel some of the symptoms of the of the virus so you might feel a bit tired or have a headache or um have achy muscles or feel a bit flowy have a bit of a temperature or feel a bit sick but
Very serious side effects are very rare so probably the most common serious side effects for the covid vaccine is something called anaphylaxis or an allergic reaction and that is definitely seen but that’s very very rare less than one in a million people and there have been some
Other very rare reports of things like inflammation in the heart muscle which can happen after the covid vaccine but again those side effects are extremely rare and millions and millions of people have had these vaccines safely other concerns around the vaccine so some of the things that you might
Hear of are that the vaccine doesn’t work so so vaccines don’t stop you from becoming from getting the an infection a viral infection so if you have a covid vaccine you can still get Co I mentioned earlier on that the viruses change very frequently because they are constantly replicating in your
Cells so they can do this thing called mutate and that means that the vaccines have to change as well because the virus is constantly changing so because of that sometimes the vaccines are not 100% perfect for that virus and but the main thing to say really is that the vaccines reduce the
Risk of you becoming very seriously unwell so certainly in my job I don’t see people coming to hospital with very severe covid anymore anywhere near as much as we used to and that’s because of the the vaccine so there’s other things that people have said to me about
Worries about the vaccine so um there wasn’t enough research done about the vaccine before it was rolled out um and it is obviously the vaccines were developed especially for covid very very quickly in a year and that’s very rare that’s never really happened before but because everybody around the world was
Trying to create a vaccine for covid there was a real Community effort trying to kind of pull together to create this vaccine to help people and the vaccines went through all of the same processes of checking and safety that any other medicine or drug would have to and there
Were other things that people have said to me about the the vaccine worrying about the vaccine changing your monthly cycle so if you’re a woman um so there is something about covid that maybe does and can do that it can affect your a monthly cycle but we don’t really know
Why or how certainly I don’t know if you guys see this very much in the long Co team but there’s been issues around the menopause and covid um uh inducing menopause in women so if this is a problem for you and it’s quite a common problem then we would really suggest
That you speak to your GP about it because there are treatments if you are um having symptoms related to the medic P so things like sweats or dryness or changes in your mood that we can treat and we can give you hormones to treat that and it’s something that’s not
Really discussed very much so we would really encourage you to speak to your GP about it if you want to so C how can you get a vaccine this is my last slide um so you can speak to your local pharmacist so they’re the best people probably to speak to I’m the
Local pharmacist and deeplish I think do vaccine clinics and um they can either arrange for you to have a vaccine or they can refer you for a vaccine you can speak to your GP there’s a a phone number called 119 which is the vaccines help line which you can ring but I don’t
Know if anybody will answer it um and you can go to a walk-in vaccination clinic so there’s a there’s a there’s a g Gateway team this is based across the hall of Greater Manchester there’s a phone number there so you can have that afterwards if you’re interested in
Getting a vaccine or you can go to a walk-in clinic um I don’t think there’s one in rdale in the next week I did check but um there’s some in Manchester but you should be able to get one through GP or your local pharmacist
So I’m going to hand over to co team now um I think we were gonna we’ll probably we’ll just all wrap up at the end if that’s all right yeah okay I’ll I’ll do you [Applause] oh yeah hang on a minute sorry thank you okay everyone can hear me okay
Brilliant thank you my name name is Chris uh I’m a lead physiotherapist over at the enhanced respiratory service which is on your doorstep at Rochdale infirmary so yes I’m going to talk about postco syndrome but I thought I would plug our service a little bit as well um
To all of you here and at home as well um so as part of the enhanced respiratory service we here representing a whole of Specialists a whole team of nurses physios we have psychologists at the back occupational therapists at the back they’re putting their hands up so speak
To them after if you need to hatel as well another nurse here taking a photo of me um so yeah um the the service is is huge uh for anyone who is familiar with the condition COPD or bronches if you have a confirmed confirmed diagnosis
Of that we have a team of nurses that see people at home seven days a week if anyone’s got a chest infection they will go and see them at home and make sure you you get better give any advice treatment antibiotics anything that you need to keep you at home and get you
Better we also have a pulmoni rehabilitation service it’s called keep acce breathe better so it’s an exercise class for people with any lung condition or lung disease uh which is a big part of our service and we also have the postco syndrome Service as well so last
Year we really focused on building the quality of our service and as Steve introduced at the start we have just been a credited to the Royal College of Physicians and only 12 services in the whole of the country have achieved that so far so we’re a really high quality
Service trying to do the best we can for the people that come and and and use our services um last year as well we also won a customer experience award for the whole of sulf rdale burry um and oldum so again it just shows the commitment
That we have to put patience at the heart of everything we do and last year I presented quite a few times not with a mic in my hand or being on YouTube but I did present to GPS there was over 50 GPS in one room uh to practice managers and
To nurses in who work in the GP practices to get our message out of what our service actually does so now we’ve done all that and now our focus is with you guys to get out a message out to the general public so being given the
Opportunity to do this by soale and T Tariq is is fantastic and we honestly hope that this is the first of many opportunities we get to come out and speak to the communities across Haywood rdale Middleton Caston um so yeah um so yeah we’ll we’ll crack on with um po covid syndrome
So uh with the GPS as well we did ask how do we engage with our communities more in their opinion what would be better and it is coming out into services like inter inter Community Halls like this having translation which I put on the slides here to hopefully engage more with
Yourselves and just we want to use every opportunity we can so postco syndrome um if you think of acute covid which Ru did talk quite a lot about with regards to an acute infection that’s within like the first four weeks of having covid it’s acute covid it’s made you generally
Unwell and hopefully within that four weeks things have got better you’ve recovered and you’ve gone back to back to normality there is an ongoing symptomatic covid so that’s kind of symptoms are lingering four to 12 weeks and then we get into the CATE category of postco syndrome so this is off the
Nice guideline it’s the National Institute of clinical Excellence which develop a lot of guidelines that the NHS use and this is their official definition so signs and symptoms that develop during or after an infection consistent with covid-19 that continue for 12 weeks or more so the symptoms
That you had initially when you first got covid they’ve not fully gone away they’re still lingering they’re still causing you problems and that’s when it comes into postco syndrome the public social media they kind of developed the term long covid which is much more wider known than postco in the health care
Professional side of things we we deem it as postco but the general public say long covid and it’s kind of like the same same thing thanks um so just another little bit background about us we’ve been a a postco since March 20 2021 we’ve seen over 550 people come through and the
Good thing about our service is that we see people face to face there are services that are set up and they’re just over the phone we do see people face to face and I’ll come on to that in much more detail later on um we were using evidence-based P practice all
Times when Co first hit there was no evidence there was everything was evolving and there were many times when I first started and I was seeing people in front of me where I actually said I don’t know I don’t know why you’re feeling like this because it was all new
But now slowly over more time more time of seeing patients we’re learning so much um and how to treat things thank you and with that the most the three most common symptoms that we do see in in the coming through in the clinics and this is not just in rdale this is kind
Of nationally has been fatigued Breathless and this brain fog brain fog meaning that um you can forget people’s names you can forget why you walked into a room to get something and and stuff like that and it can really get people anxious it can really get people down
About oh what’s happening why am I changing like this these are the three main symptoms that we see coming through on a regular basis this um there’s an app that has been created for covid-19 and in the app we ask people to kind of log what their
Symptoms are and this is for the central Manchester area uh or greater Manchester sorry these are the common symptoms that were being uh logged by people just purely off a questionnaire and how what they were experiencing so we’ve got fatigue pain issues with uh functional daily tasks anxiety problems with
Cognition memory uh breath lessness cough um breathlessness at rest feeling low mood there’s so many symptoms it’s not just where you go to a GP and you might be only allowed to talk about one thing with us there’s there’s lots of it’s kind of impossible in the Realms of
Postco syndrome that we can just talk about one thing it’s very rare that I’ve met one person who’s just got one thing going on this seems to be a big cluster of these symptoms yeah so yeah so what we did as a team recently we set up a
Little bit of a project where we tried to tackle these most common symptoms by looking at what skills we have as professionals me being a physio psychologist occupational therapist and how we can help people that come through to our service the best we can thanks see you thank so we focused on
These and then again so we can split them up into to a physical aspect and we can also look at the mental aspect and there’s a big crossover between the two and it’s really important that we look at that and I think when we first started the postco service there was a
Lot of people that would come through and say I think it’s all in my head or people are dismissing me they’re saying it’s not real it’s not it’s these symptoms are something else and so many com so many people felt like when they came in front of us that they were a
Fraud sometimes almost but you know these symptoms that the people are experiencing were really real and is how we address these so there’s a big correlation this slide thanks to Rachel um this just shows the correlation between physical and mental health that there’s a big crossover in this area here you know how
Our mind is thinking can impact where our body is what our body is thinking as well and what’s happening there so we have to we can’t dismiss the crossover between the two and this is what we try and do in our service so by physio occupational therapy and psychological medicine so we’re trying
To do like almost a free pronged attack on treating the symptoms the best we can thank you so physiotherapy what what do I do I basically will look at your lung function so people think of physios is knees and backs and stuff like that but no we do lungs we do many different
Things and one of them is specializing in lungs so we can assess your breathing a lot of people have cough a lot of people have a change in their breathing pattern we don’t think about our breathing generally on a day-to-day basis but it’s the first thing we have
When we enter the world and it’s the last thing we have when we enter the when we leave the world as well but our breathing pattern can actually change and that can change by physical means and it can also change by mental means as well if we’re anxious if we anxious
You don’t tend to breathe family you breathe quite fast and and that has a massive impact to how we breathe on our body so we work on that we we work on exercise if we need everyone knows there was a big time when we were all
Isolating stay home stay safe and a lot of people generally deconditioned in that time as well not exercising not going to the gym many services many gyms were closed so just working through that as well and we can also arrange special tests so yes we are health professionals and Allied health
Professionals uh as their official term but we have access to doctors light roof Specialists Consultants um you name it we can get special tests done and and explore further to try and get the best treatment for you to make you feel better moving on to occupational therapy
We’ve got Laura and Lauren at the back I won’t call you both up um but yeah they are occupational therapists they specialize in managing fatigue managing uh they can give you advice on how you’re managing your activities of daily living they can look at how you if you need any specialist equipment to
Help you in any of your tasks they can look at sleep there’s so much occupational therapists do account sing their praises highly enough um so it’s really really good to have them on board on the team as well and then psychological medicine so yeah so so much again with regards to
The psychology so a team um they help you live alongside your your covid symptoms offer grute therapy um onetoone therapy focusing on your functioning in your overall quality of life and again like I’ve already kind of touched upon the the cross between the physical and
The mental aspects of of of U of how you’re managing your life at the moment um so yeah it’s it’s I can’t sing enough Praises about the service really um there is a really good website so this if you’re really good on the web it’s called your covid recovery so I uh if
You’re at home screenshot or take a photo of it now uh it is fully translatable into any language um or lots of languages put the eru version up uh to show you so it’s just got self tips general advice a lot of what rof was going through uh with you before on
On tips and stuff like that it’ll tell you what the common symptoms are and what you can do to self-manage when it becomes more than that though and things are worsening or not getting better as Ruth touched upon before then we do encourage you to contact your GP because GPS like I said
We’ve been out to them they know about our service it’s you guys that maybe don’t know about our service but hopefully spreading this message it will contact your GP your GP will then initiate a referral to us and we act very very quickly at the moment we will
See people within less than four weeks so we will see you very quickly assess you you’ll have an initial telephone uh triage to go through your symptoms and then 95% of the people will come through and see us face to face and we’ll go through to see how we can best help you
And put you on a kind of a treatment Pathway to hopefully get you fully recovered off from your symptoms next slide and again just more kind of examples of what the website is about so yeah um so again thank you so much for uh allowing
Us to come and talk to you today uh as I said there there’s so many strings to our service that I would love to come back if you let me and you’re happy and the sound quality is okay for me all this lot um if if you’re happy because
Like I said pulmonary Rehabilitation the exercise classes so if you have on know anybody in your family or any friends who have COPD or uh any any condition like that then just I’m happy to come back and tell you about pulm Rehabilitation and with regards to
COPD again unique to our service we are setting up a study uh which actually starts on the 1st of February and we’re hopefully designing an exercise class specifically for the South Asian population so again that could be looking at how we design a class would it be a same
Sex class would it be in a mosque anything like that but again we’re trying to really engage with the local community and provide and just try and reduce Health inequalities that we see all the time we want you to access our services definitely okay so for more information
About that I’ll just plug Amy if you put your hand up Amy U so yeah Amy in the room has got a little uh poster on the on the on the study that we’re we’re looking at starting it’s ourselves in in Rochdale and there’s Lester as well so
Lester are a really big big service in terms of respiratory in the in the whole of the country and again another Great Scout for Rochdale is that we’re being paired up with with Leicester so hopefully I’ve said enough about our service to to for you to know that it’s
A high quality service um and like I say the the the we’re just on your doorstep and spread the message basically thank [Applause] you um so hopefully um that has been helpful and you’ve all learned a little bit more about what viruses are and what
We can do to prevent them and a bit more about the amazing long covid team in Rochdale and how they might be able to help you has anybody got any questions Please feel free to ask anything there is no question too small okay I’m going to come over to you just want to ask you um obviously back to open Nic so what’s the situation of the GU people need to so nicely what is the latest information thank you that’s an
Excellent question so that was do we have to isolate and should be be wearing masks um so no you don’t have to isolate any longer if you have covid um in fact in the hospital we’re not even routinely testing people for covid any longer um in terms of
Masks um um we know that prob the evidence around using masks is is is not particularly brilliant um but we know that probably the main benefit of wearing a mask is you reduce the risk of somebody else becoming unwell with a virus so um the main benefit of wearing
A mask is to try and reduce transmission to somebody else rather than reduce the risk of you getting a virus so everybody wears Mas masks all the time it probably does help to reduce the transmission of viruses um again we don’t you don’t have to wear them um obviously some people do
Wear them and we do sometimes wear them in hospital but it probably going to help reduce the risk to others rather than to you personally does anybody else want to ask anything dad out loud um as folks spend more more time in Long Co and therefore they’re
Not able to work or maybe have been Saed or dismissed or in some way had to resign Financial impress in words I guess emerg during your yeah how team resp support yeah so um Laura’s here as well you can help with that um so yeah
It is a big question that we ask because if a lot of people with with covid um a lot of people it’s kind of get the infection and it can be lifechanging they can be 34 years old working full-time and then all of a sudden completely gone and and Dred and they
Can’t get to work mixed stories uh pressures of wanting to get back to work pressures from the employer wanting them to get back to work and there can be this kind of this yeah cycle of trying to get them fit enough but then not push them too hard especially when it comes
To fatigue as well chronic fatigue um so yeah that certainly plays and and we always ask kind of like how anxious people are the depression uh and then with regards to like Laura set helping up we have kind of like a we call it vocational rehab so
It’s how we try and get someone back into work uh trying to support them through like a returned phase to work and stuff like that and then yes certainly from a financial perspective we link him with our kind of communities and you know there all these different
Uh citizens and advice and stuff like that we can access to and just provide as much support as we can really yeah that is that okay yeah m doing a project about return to work in which has Grant ethical approval last week very good you the
Cies yeah so can you explain this or can you ask pleas to tell us bit more about it yeah of course I can yeah it’s up to you Amy yeah any’s going to step up yeah thank you hi everyone my name is unity of Manchester I’m a lectur in
Mental health actually but I have a background in working with C so um conditions older have condition their breathing um there’s a really effective treatment for CD that Chris mentioned before which is pulmonary Rehabilitation what we know is we’ve looked at the evidence and the research that’s out there is that accessary
Rehabilitation isn’t always equal and that people from South Asian communities are less likely to be told about pulmonary rehab to be referred to pulmonary rehab and when people are um refer to pulmonary rehab they may be more likely to drop out the program before they complete the program so the
Program involves um education about living and managing COPD it also involves exercise it can involve some psychological components as well all to support you to live bre better and keep active I think chis said before um and what we really want to do is really understand what the barriers are that
Are keeping South Asian people with CD from attending and completing ponary rehab so we have a research project which is funded by the National Institute for health research a government organization um so really invested in this in terms of really understanding this and coming up with better solution
So we’re going to be working on this for about 18 months starting in um and what we’re going to be doing is wanting to speak to people with CD sorry do I have to buy it sorry hang on I’m just gonna hold it because I can’t will that work okay um where was
I we’re wanting yeah so we’re starting in February and what we want to do is speak people from the South Asian Community who are living with COPD and understand their experience first of living with COPD um and understand if they’ve heard about pulmonary rehab before um if they
Have then have they been have they been referred has anyone ever talked to them about it how if they’ve been how did they find it did they complete the program and what what did they like about it or what would they like to to see differently uh done different
Differently that would help support more people from the South Asian communities to access pulmonary rehab and we’ll also talk to um health professionals who deliver pulmonary rehab about the changes we can make to the program and we’ll talk to kind of national what we call Key stakeholders or key informants
From across the country who are involved in commissioning pman rehab and writing the guidelines for p rehab so that we can um come at this from every angle if you like so by the end of our 18month project what we hope to have is a culturally adapted version of pulmonary
Rehabs it’s going to be more accessible um more acceptable um and easier for people from the South Asian Community to access um and we’ll also hopefully have developed a community engagement strategy um to talk to more people from the South Asian Community about COPD so if people are starting to experience
Breathlessness and symptoms that could be COPD then they’re more likely to go and get those symptoms checked they’re more likely to perhaps have tests that might mean um they’re diagnosed with COPD and then they can access this really effective um treatment as well so over the next 18 months we’ll be working
With Chris’s team like he said and the team from Leicester as well um to find people who have COPD who are interested in in talking to us um so it may be that hopefully I’ll come back at some other time and talk a bit more about this project and also other research projects
That we have ongoing at the University of Manchester um which often might be around other long-term conditions or mental health and psychological care as well um that we could talk about we could perhaps do a seminar at some point so I hope that was okay just off the
Cuff but thank you very much for the opportunity to come and meet everyone today Dr K do you want will you do that just kind of if there’s any quick summary bits to sum up and N do if that’s all right and then see if anybody’s got any questions and then if
Not then we can um adure thank you thanks Dr so sorry no I think I’ll just hold it yeah because thank you so much thank you so basically aess or especially you know unfortunately most important fac thank you question sorry thanks I just wanted to ask about
Can you have long Co or syts like long after another any other viral illness or cold or flu and if you do answer that yeah for it so yeah I mean the the definition of long Co or postco is symptoms um specifically from having the the a positive diagnosis or if there’s
No positive diagnosis because not many people are testing now but if it is similar to co then yeah we would kind of treat you know treat the symptoms we’re seeing as far as it come in after other viruses like one example re my I’m going going to go little now so with regards
To the taste and smell so that became popular because of covid covid-19 but I’m aware that it’s not specific to covid-19 and there are actually other viruses that have caused loss of taste and smell but obviously because of social media and everything nowadays and it’s and it’s covid-19 is the latest
Virus loss of taste and smell is associated now with but it’s not specific to that it has happened on other viruses before uh don’t know if this others um there are some viruses that are associated with chronic fatigue so things like Epstein bar virus I don’t if you’ve ever heard
Of moo but that is caused by ep B virus and um there is definitely a kind of post viral fatigue phenomenon which can happen with some viruses I don’t think it’s very common after the common respiratory viruses that we’ve talked about today apart from covid and I think
It’s also important to say that although long covid is very serious and some people with covid seem to have symptoms for longer perhaps than they do with other viruses the vast majority of people will still get better after they’ve had covid and even if you do have persistent symptoms with Co after
You’ve had covid most of those people will get better so there is a small proportion of people who are to develop covid a small number of the whole who are left with symptoms that can go on for a long long time and that can be very serious but in terms of the whole
Population that number of people is quite low I think that’s fair to say okay anybody else got any questions I want to know relationship between and strong any research thank you that is a brilliant question thank you for asking so there is definitely a relationship between covid being infected with covid and being in hospital with a serious covid infection and blood clots so blood clots in your legs like something called
A deep vein thrombosis or blood clots in your lungs so we know that if you are in hospital with covid then you are at a higher risk than the rest of the people in the hospital for getting a blood clot the general population so if you
Were not in hospital with covid we don’t think that there is an increased risk of blood clots um in terms of heart attacks and strokes we don’t know really I think is the answer I think because covid was so common for such a long period of time we
We saw a lot of people who were developing heart attacks and strokes at around the same time they had covid and obviously a lot of the people who um were in hospital especially during the first few years of covid before we had vaccines were very very unwell and then
They may then have gone on to develop more serious complications of a serious infection like a heart attack or a stroke so that can happen after you’ve had any infection with a virus or a bacteria I don’t think there’s any definite evidence to say that if you
Youve had covid you’re at higher risk of a heart attack or if you’ve had covid you’re at higher risk of a stroke but there does seem to be some Association so the two things had certainly happened along the same time but it’s hard to know if one causes the other does that
Make sense there is a lot of um there are a lot of theories about Co specifically as a virus and thinking that there might be something particular about the co virus that affects the blood and affects clotting and one of the theories around why people get long
Covid is that there are some ideas that it might increase clotting in very very tiny blood vessels that we we can’t kind of measure very easily so that’s not like a big blood C in your lung or in your leg but it’s very very in very very
Small blood facils but I don’t think we know for definite we’re still learning does that answer your question yeah brilliant does anybody else want to ask anything yeah so if nobody else has got any questions then I think we’re all gonna we’ll be sticking around for a bit
So if you want to ask anything to myself or to Chris or to the long Co team at the back or Dr müller’s still here Dr k please come and speak to us we’re very happy to be spoken to you can take the oxygen probes home I know there’s only
Four of them so you have to divide them up between you um and then obviously we’ve got a living well team here at the back and also genes and health so please go and speak to them and get your cholesterol checks and you can have a blood pressure check and speak to jeans
And health if you haven’t already thank you very much [Applause] everyone thank you is pharmacist used to be youth club in pharmacist our friend neighbor and his there before and of course our living te is do do not go home without having your blood glucose test and the blood blood
Test done certainly our te team is here and and regarding CD as you heard from our and colleague that we will be setting up study I know my team my my colleagues here so we will set up a study COPD study session at De with different languages we will will
Contribute of research so uh to say thank you uh I think I need some so can I call upon my great friend 20 years ago when I was becoming a passionate train community worker in this neighborhood and I call upon the my really good friend at that time the director ofal
Council’s Community Department that was and and has still the same passion same young Spirit he’s still connected with the Deep now centers like deepish are open today because andry 20 years ago was training ourselves he was empowering communities so can I call upon doctor ra
Rths to say thank you and few words at the end of our session yeah well that was bit of a Dr near there um I’ve been call lots of things Community doctor actually I like that that’s that’s a kind of a nice idea um but but what I think is most important
About events like tonight is that the Professional Services that are here uh from the hospital service from the physio teams and so on and so forth the university researchers it’s crucial that they’re reach out to the local community because that’s the way they learn that’s the way they improve services to us to
Us all and so I suppose what I want to say thanks to S and the team the management committee for for all the continued effort that you make but I suppose make a plea to us I’m I’m retired now uh and the people here locally go back home and spread the word
Amongst your local friends your family and and make sure sure that you use the Fantastic services that you heard about tonight and and contribute to the learning that needs to take place to make the world a better place so so do please take that message home and and I
Won’t come next time because you won’t drop me in it will you thanks very much really thank you to Dr L team of researchers the Consultants I’m sure there’ll be professors in future can I call upon Steve to say thank you to the team of our clinicians okay thank you so final words
From me uh just a huge thanks to everybody really uh the presenters in particular so uh to Chris and to Ruth thank you it’s been [Applause] really and thank you like I said know in between food and the test my team is going to set the food up and then in
Between that uh so can we get people to get your glucose level test the blood pressure test and and talk to our colleagues in the gens and health Team so thank you very much and our next seminar is going to be on Mental Health introduce around April time
Rachel Rachel’s and this is Dr P kushar I’m not P so p is um is a psychiatrist and he is also a researcher at the University of Manchester and Rachel is also putting a hand up so Rachel’s one of the psychologists she works with the long Co team so hopefully
They’re going to be able to come and speak to you about mental health and um any kind of mental health issues you might have so if there’s anything specific that you want to hear about for the next session please ask one of them and I’m sure they’d be happy to talk
About it with you and you know maybe discuss it in a bit more detail next time thank you everyone