Blog

In March  we hosted the first Yorkshire asthma summit: ‘Breathe Better Yorkshire’. The primary aim for this virtual event was to provide an opportunity to develop a Yorkshire wide approach to the diagnosis and management of asthma. Pulling together the three respiratory networks from West Yorkshire, South Yorkshire and Hull and North Yorkshire, we hoped to understand how we could practically work together to deliver better, co-ordinated care to meet patient needs and help reduce the carbon footprint of SABA inhalers (the blue inhalers that most asthmatics use).

Chaired by Dr Ian Clifton, Respiratory Consultant and Clinical Lead for Respiratory Medicine at St James’s University Hospital, and Prof. Ian Sabroe, Consultant Respiratory Physician at Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, the summit had more than one hundred professionals involved in asthma care registered from across primary and secondary care. The event allowed us to showcase some of the innovative projects and approaches being taken by organisations and individuals in an attempt to share learning and best practice.

The agenda was diverse, and included speakers from cross the Yorkshire and Humber region.  Experts in respiratory medicine gave insights into how Clinical Respiratory Networks could function effectively, how to address inequalities in asthma care and how to identify uncontrolled asthmatics within primary care.  Discussions also took place around the need to link together clinical pathways for children and adults, and the role that practitioners could play in managing inhaled therapies differently in order to benefit both the patient and the environment.

At the end of the summit, the floor was opened to questions for the panel  chaired by Dr Katherine Hickman and Professor Dinesh Saralaya who lead on the respiratory agenda in Bradford, and created some interesting debate on the future of respiratory care in Yorkshire and protocols to drive improved standards of care across the region (you can take a look at the programme for more details).

Following the summit, we have been able to identify those areas that can benefit from further support and we shared examples of good practice to help improve care outcomes for asthmatic patients including sharing clinical pathways and referral templates, discussing consistency in identifying patients who are uncontrolled in primary care and sharing training and educational resources.

We are hoping to organise another summit in about 6-12 months’ time to evaluate the progress that we have made and prioritise future workstreams.

The recording of the ‘Yorkshire Asthma Summit: Breathe Better Yorkshire’ is now available.

If you would like more information please email info@yhahsn.com