Almost half of hospital patients have been discharged without receiving the results of their coronavirus test – including some patients who were sent to care homes, new research from Healthwatch and British Cross has revealed.
Independent national patient body Healthwatch England said it had learned many patients were discharged from hospitals between March and August this year without proper assessments with many vulnerable people sent home without medication, equipment or the care they needed.
At the start of the pandemic thousands of patients were discharged to care homes as NHS England instructed hospitals to free up 15,000 beds ahead of the first wave of coronavirus.
Approximately 25,000 patients were sent to care homes with some not tested, sparking fears this helped seed care homes with the virus. There have been around 16,000 care home deaths linked to COVID-19.
According to a survey of almost 600 discharged patients and interviews with 60 NHS staff, Healthwatch England said it had found serious flaws with the way hospitals had followed NHS England’s instructions.
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Source: The Independent, 24 October 2020
"Women may be suicidal or want to die. They may have thoughts about harming their baby. It's our job to keep them safe until they can keep themselves safe," says Debbie Sells.
She manages a mother-and-baby unit in Nottingham which supports a small group of new mothers and pregnant women with serious psychological problems.
It's one of 19 units across England which each year treat about 800 women with perinatal mental health problems like psychosis and severe depression.
Clinicians say it is important to keep mothers and babies together to protect their relationship and the infant's development.
Some clinicians fear there may soon be an increased demand for their services due to extra pressures pregnant women are facing during the pandemic.
"We are hearing stories of women delivering on their own and not having the support of their partner, says Debbie.
"A traumatic birth can lead on to other things. Now not only are women becoming seriously unwell with a baby, but it's happening within a pandemic"
NHS England says while it is understandable some women and their families may have felt uneasy about seeking help in the early stages of the outbreak, it is vital they ask for support if it is needed.
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Source: BBC News, 26 October 2020
A fourth suspected suicide has occurred at a mental health trust which was recently warned by the Care Quality Commission after three other similar inpatient deaths in quick succession, HSJ can reveal.
All four deaths at Devon Partnership Trust had common themes, including the use of ligatures, and occurred amid a year-long delay to the trust’s plan to reduce ligature risks.
Figures obtained by HSJ under freedom of information laws also reveal the trust took nearly a year to investigate the first two deaths. The target is 90 days.
The trust told HSJ it had faced “humongous” problems addressing ligature risks and had been too “patient” with another trust which was helping to investigate the deaths.
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Source HSJ, 27 October 2020
Levels of protective antibodies in people wane "quite rapidly" after coronavirus infection, say researchers.
Antibodies are a key part of our immune defences and stop the virus from getting inside the body's cells. The Imperial College London team found the number of people testing positive for antibodies has fallen by 26% between June and September.
They say immunity appears to be fading and there is a risk of catching the virus multiple times.
More than 350,000 people in England have taken an antibody test as part of the REACT-2 study so far.
In the first round of testing, at the end of June and the beginning of July, about 60 in 1,000 people had detectable antibodies. But in the latest set of tests, in September, only 44 per 1,000 people were positive.
"Immunity is waning quite rapidly, we're only three months after our first [round of tests] and we're already showing a 26% decline in antibodies," said Prof Helen Ward, one of the researchers.
The fall was greater in those over 65, compared with younger age groups, and in those without symptoms compared with those with full-blown COVID-19. The number of healthcare workers with antibodies remained relatively high, which the researchers suggest may be due to regular exposure to the virus.
There have been very few confirmed cases of people getting Covid twice. However, the researchers warn this may be due to immunity only just starting to fade since the peak infection rates of March and April.
The hope is the second infection will be milder than the first, even if immunity does decline, as the body should have an "immune memory" of the first encounter and know how to fight back.
The researchers say their findings do not scupper hopes of a vaccine, which may prove more effective than a real infection.
One of the researchers, Prof Graham Cooke, said: "The big picture is after the first wave, the great majority of the country didn't have evidence of protective immunity. The need for a vaccine is still very large, the data doesn't change that."
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Source: BBC News, 27 October 2020
A hospital that was at the centre of a major inquiry into unsafe maternity care five years ago is facing new questions over its safety after bosses admitted a baby boy would have survived if not for mistakes by hospital staff.
Jenny Feasey, from Heysham in Lancashire, is still coming to terms with the loss of her son Toby who was stillborn at the Royal Lancaster Infirmary, part of the University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay Foundation Trust in January 2017 after a series of mistakes by staff who did not act on signs she had pre-eclampsia.
Jenny, 33, has backed The Independent’s campaign for improved maternity safety and called on midwives to learn lessons after what happened to her family.
She added: “This was an easily avoidable situation. They just didn’t piece it together, all they had to do was carry out a test and I lost my son because of it."
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Source: The Independent, 25 October 2020
It has a plethora of symptoms, strikes the young and old, and lasts for months – maybe much longer. It’s also so new that scientists aren’t sure what they’re dealing with. For those whose lives have been deeply affected by long-term repercussions of Covid, the battle to be recognised is just the start.
There are thousands of people in the UK dealing with the long-term effects of COVID-19, experiencing debilitating symptoms that last for weeks and months beyond the initial infection.
One of the most commonly reported is fatigue, along with breathlessness, joint pain and muscle aches. Neurological issues are common, particularly brain ‘fog’ and a loss of memory and concentration. Some have chest pain or heart palpitations, skin rashes, diarrhoea, headaches, hearing or eyesight problems, or hair loss. Others have lost their senses of taste and smell. In online support groups, people are sharing stories of bone-crippling exhaustion, constant pain in their chest or heart, or the inability to remember a name or follow a conversation.
These people don’t fit the binary model of the virus we thought we knew – that if you’re in the small minority who are seriously affected you might be hospitalised, end up in ICU or worse; otherwise you’ll likely be better after two weeks. Many only had mild cases originally and were not deemed to be in vulnerable categories.
Widely varying symptoms have added to the confusion and fear surrounding the condition, which currently has no formal definition. For months, people with Long Covid had no one to turn to but each other. It’s only recently – through increasing research emerging, and sufferers publicly sharing their stories – that it has started to be taken more seriously. Earlier this month, NHS England announced a £10 million investment to set up one-stop services for physical and mental health issues caused by Covid alongside a Long Covid task force and, crucially, research on 10,000 patients.
Not much is known about what causes Long Covid and there is little firm consensus. There are theories it occurs when a patient’s immune system overreacts to the infection, which can lead to widespread inflammation that theoretically affects any organ. Last week, a study by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) suggested Long Covid symptoms could actually be caused by four separate syndromes: post-intensive-care syndrome, post-viral fatigue syndrome, permanent organ damage to the lungs and heart, or lingering COVID-19 symptoms.
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Source: The Telegraph, 24 October 2020
n the day Boris Johnson was admitted to hospital with COVID-19, Vivien Morrison received a phone call from a doctor at East Surrey Hospital in Redhill. Stricken by the virus, her father, Raymond Austin, had taken a decisive turn for the worse. The spritely grandfather, who still worked as a computer analyst at the age of 82, was not expected to survive the day. His oxygen levels had fallen to 70% rather than the normally healthy levels of at least 94%.
Vivien says she was told by the doctor that her father would not be given intensive care treatment or mechanical ventilation because he “ticked too many boxes” under the guidelines the hospital was using.
While ministers delayed lockdown, soaring cases were putting immense pressure on hospitals. This investigation from The Times shows officials devised a brutal ‘triage tool’ to keep the elderly and frail away.
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Source: The Sunday Times, 25 October 2020)
When Jess and Patrick discovered they were expecting their first baby in the new year, they looked forward to an early glimpse of their unborn child via an ultrasound scan.
But the couple, who live in the north-west of England, were soon told that Patrick would not be able to attend any antenatal appointments, including routine scans at 12 and 20 weeks. When their baby begins its journey into the world, Patrick will be permitted to join Jess only when labour is fully established, and he must leave an hour after delivery. He will not be able to visit his new family in hospital again.
“It’s taken the shine off the pregnancy,” said Jess, a junior doctor. “Patrick hasn’t been able to come to a single appointment. It’s making me very anxious and stressed – I’ve had actual nightmares about things going wrong and Patrick not being with me. He’s had to wait at home when I’ve gone for appointments, worrying and waiting for me to call to say everything’s OK.”
The hospital where Jess will give birth is among 43% of NHS trusts that – despite official guidance – have not eased restrictions imposed during lockdown on partners attending antenatal appointments, being present throughout labour, and staying with new mothers and babies after the birth. And as Covid transmissions rise across the UK, almost a quarter of NHS trusts have said they expect to reimpose such restrictions.
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Source: The Guardian, 24 October 2020
"I still have nightmares most nights about being completely out of my depth."
Gemma, a ward nurse in Northern Ireland, was redeployed to a critical care unit at the end of March when the first wave of coronavirus struck.
"I had never looked after a critically ill intensive care patient in my life," she says.
"I just thought, I'm coming in here and I'm going to die. I'm going to catch Covid and I'm going to be one of those patients in the beds."
As the second wave of the pandemic takes deep root across parts of the UK, thousands of NHS workers are struggling to recover from what they have already been through.
"We were all in PPE all the time," recalls Nathan, a senior intensive care nurse at a hospital in the Midlands. "All you can see is people's eyes, you can't see anything else."
He describes trying to help junior members of staff survive long and difficult days.
"And I'd see these eyes as big as saucers saying help me, do something. Make this right. Fix this."
"The pressure was insane, and the anxiety just got me," he says. "I couldn't sleep, and I couldn't eat, I was sick before work, I was shaking before I got into my car in the morning."
Nathan ended up having time off with severe anxiety, but he is now back at the hospital, waiting for the beds to fill up again.
The BBC has spoken to a number of nurses and doctors across the UK who are deeply apprehensive about what lies ahead this winter.
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Source: BBC News, 24 October 2020
A trust is investigating after two junior doctors developed covid following an offsite event attended by 22 juniors where social distancing rules were allegedly ignored.
The cases, involving doctors from the Royal Surrey Foundation Trust in Guildford, have been declared an outbreak by Public Health England and police have investigated the incident.
But HSJ understands that contact tracing has concluded no patients needed to be tested because staff had worn appropriate PPE at all times and those involved had swiftly self-isolated once they realised they might have covid or had been at risk of exposure to it.
It is not known whether any of the doctors had returned to work after the event before realising they might have been exposed to covid.
Dr Mark Evans, deputy medical director, said: “Protecting our patients is our priority and we are committed to ensuring that all of our staff follow government guidance. This incident took place outside of work and has been reported appropriately, and there was no disruption to our services for patients.”
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Source: HSJ, 22 October 2020
Mass cancellations of routine operations in England are inevitable this autumn and winter despite an NHS edict that hospitals must not again disrupt normal care, doctors’ leaders have said.
Organisations representing frontline doctors, including the British Medical Association (BMA), also criticised NHS England for ordering hospitals to provide “near normal” levels of non-Covid care in the second wave of the pandemic, and demanded that fines for failing to meet targets be scrapped.
"Things are very, very difficult at the moment, very challenging at the moment. It feels like a juggling act every day,” said one official in the South Yorkshire NHS. “The problem is both the growing numbers of patients coming into hospital with Covid and the numbers of staff we have off sick due to Covid, either because they are ill themselves or because someone in their household has symptoms, so they are isolating.”
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Source: The Guardian, 23 October 2020
Parents and professionals have been devastated by the impact of the pandemic on some of the UK’s most vulnerable patients
Kelly Stoor gave birth to her daughter, Kaia, 14 weeks early. On 12 March, the midwife held her up for Kelly to see before whisking Kaia off to the neonatal unit for critical care. Kaia became seriously ill and was transferred to a hospital in Southampton, 50 miles away from home, for specialist treatment just before lockdown was imposed on 23 March. While there, she teetered on the edge of life and death for weeks and underwent life-saving surgery twice.
The impact on Kelly, her husband, Max, and their other three children has been enormous. Hospital restrictions in April dictated that only one parent was allowed to visit. Both parents were not able not hold their daughter for the first time until 88 days after she was born.
“It was extremely difficult,” says Kelly. “I wasn’t allowed to hold her because of Covid. I had to wear gloves if I was going to touch her. We didn’t know if she was going to make it, and Max and I weren’t allowed in together to be with her. There was one time I was with her for three hours and I couldn’t cope any more. I wanted to break.”
Kelly is not alone. In the UK, at least 25,000 children are living with conditions that require palliative care support and their lives, along with those of their families, have been upended by the coronavirus pandemic and accompanying restrictions.
A report by Rainbow Trust found that lockdown was a distressing experience for many; 80% of those surveyed by the charity in April said their situation was worse or much worse than before lockdown. Nearly 60% of parents, meanwhile, say that their mental health is worse than before the pandemic.
Families have had to take on the strain of caring full-time for a child with a life-limiting illness, such as cancer or neurological conditions, with little to no support. There has been no respite, explains Dr Jon Rabbs, a consultant paediatrician and trustee for Rainbow Trust. When lockdown was announced, many community healthcare services had to stop face to face contact and special schools which supported children were also closed. “One of my families is at breaking point, they are so exhausted and worried,” he says.
In child healthcare there have been delays, he says. Urgent treatment is always available but follow-up care has been cancelled or delayed in some places. “In my practice we have not missed any significant relapses,” he adds. “But imagine the worry not knowing whether things were going to be OK or not.”
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Source: The Guardian, 22 October 2020
The most comprehensive picture so far of how covid’s second wave has hit the NHS in the north of England is revealed in new figures obtained by HSJ.
The latest data confirms that parts of the North West region now have more coronavirus patients in hospital beds than they did in the spring. It comes amid intense public debate about the best way to fight covid, and whether or not it is close to swamping the NHS.
Collected from local NHS sources in a joint HSJ and Independent investigation, the information shows for example that:
Lancashire and South Cumbria had 544 confirmed covid hospital patients yesterday (around 15-18% of the bed base), about 20 more than during the April peak.
Liverpool University Hospitals – which remains the most severely affected trust – had 408 confirmed covid patients yesterday (20-25% of bed base), whereas it never topped 400 in the spring.
The data is sent routinely by trusts to NHS England but most of it is not published – something some politicians are now calling for.
As of yesterday, there were nearly 6,100 confirmed-covid patients across England, about 650 of whom were in critical care, and 560 receiving mechanical ventilation, according to information shared with HSJ.
The number of “unoccupied” hospital beds is much lower now than in the spring, when they were cleared out in anticipation of a major hit. In the North West, up to 5,500 acute beds were reported as “unoccupied” in the spring, whereas the figure now is about 2,500 (around 14-18% of the bed base).
However, critical care is the major pinch point in the most affected areas, with nearly half of the mechanical ventilation beds open at Liverpool’s hospitals (29 of 62) occupied by confirmed covid patients; and a third of those across the North West (178 of 556).
However, hospitals in the area have opened very few extra critical care “surge” beds so far. The total numbers of mechanical ventilation (a subset of critical care) beds open in LUH and the rest of the region has not increased much in recent weeks, and falls well short of what they have declared they could open as potential surge capacity, if they cancelled large amounts of non-urgent care and reorganised staffing and wards.
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Source: HSJ, 23 October 2020
London-based HealthUnlocked has been acquired by worldwide leader Corrona.
HealthUnlocked is a social network of 1.3 million patients across hundreds of condition-specific communities. Moderated by over 500 patient advocacy groups, it captures insights to better understand what matters most to these patients.
Corrona, based in Massachusetts, US, describes itself as a built-for-purpose source of gold-standard real-world evidence.
“By combining with HealthUnlocked, we are expanding our broad set of capabilities–ranging from highly granular and longitudinal structured data across our eight registries, to broader patient insights from HealthUnlocked,” said Abbe Steel, Chief Patient Officer of Corrona.
“The HealthUnlocked communities provide access to engaged patients across the globe, allowing us to better understand the patient experience and what matters most to patients."
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Source: Business Cloud, 22 October 2020
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has called for ‘ministerial ownership’ to end the ‘inhumane’ care of patients with learning difficulties and autism in hospital – after finding some cases where people had been held in long-term segregation for more than 10 years.
Following its second review into the uses of restraint and segregation on people with a learning difficulty, autism and mental health problems, the CQC has warned it “cannot be confident that their human rights are upheld, let alone be confident that they are supported to live fulfilling lives”.
The review was ordered by health and social care secretary Matt Hancock in late 2018 in response to mounting concerns about the quality of care in these areas.
According to the report, published today, inspectors found examples people being in long-term segregation for at least 13 years, and in hospital for up to 25 years. It also found evidence showing the proportion of children from a black or black British background subjected to prolonged seclusion on child and adolescent mental health wards was almost four times that of other ethnicities.
Looking at care received in hospital the CQC found many care plans were “generic” and “meaningless” and patients did not have access to any therapeutic care.
Reviewers also found people’s physical healthcare needs were overlooked. One women was left in pain for several months due to her provider failing to get medical treatment.
The regulator also reviewed the use of restrictive practices within community settings. While it found higher quality care, and the use of restrictive practices was less common, it said there was no national reporting system for this sector.
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Source: HSJ, 22 October 2020
With so many operations put on hold when the pandemic started in March, surgeon Douglas Hartley and a team of medical veterans got to work pioneering new types of protective equipment.
When the coronavirus pandemic first hit the UK, thousands of surgical procedures were put on hold. For surgeons like Douglas, who performs operations on deaf children to restore their hearing, this created a significant moral dilemma – he wanted to get back into surgery to provide this vital care, but didn’t want to inadvertently catch or pass on COVID-19 in the process.
Douglas regularly carries out cochlear implant surgery, a process in which a surgeon embeds an electronic device which stimulates the hearing nerve in the ear. The scientific evidence is clear that this surgery needs to be performed at the earliest opportunity so that these children can benefit from being able to hear at a vital stage in their development.
But performing the surgery as normal would have put both children and surgical teams in danger. They needed to come up with another way of doing things. The team in Nottingham had to combine creativity and science to develop a novel and safe way to restart cochlear implant surgery in a matter of just a few weeks.
The team used a systematic evidence-based approach to evaluate a variety of PPE for its usability and effectiveness. During simulated cochlear implant surgery, they evaluated each type of PPE across several parameters, including its effect on a surgeon’s ability to communicate, their field of vision, and their comfort.
Many of the PPE options were found to substantially restrict the surgeon’s vision during operating. That rendered them unsafe for performing this sort of surgery. Instead, they found that the combination of “spoggles” and a half-face respirator mask had consistently superior performance across all aspects of clinical usability compared with all other options.
During their studies, Douglas and his team also worked with a surgical product manufacturer to develop a novel drape, basically a tent, that was designed to be suspended from a microscope covering the patient’s head and torso to provide a physical barrier between the site of drilling and the rest of the team.
They found that the operating tent significantly contained the droplets and prevented them from spreading around the theatre environment. They are the first – and are currently only – group in the world to develop an operating tent design that is marked for medical use. After completing our studies, we now had appropriate PPE and a protective operating tent to permit the safe restarting of cochlear implant surgery during the pandemic.
These recommendations were rapidly disseminated internationally via webinars and journal publications and quickly adopted as standard patient care by Nottingham University NHS Foundation Trust and, subsequently, embraced in other departments in the UK and across the world.
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Source: The Independent, 22 October 2020
The staff-side committee of a major hospital trust has stopped working with its leadership, with its chair alleging an ‘endemic’ culture of ‘racism, discrimination and bullying’.
Irene Pilia, staff-side committee chair at King’s College Hospital Foundation Trust, told colleagues that the decision was taken “in the interests of staff”, especially black, Asian and minority ethnic workers, and expressed concerns about the organisation’s disciplinary procedures. She said the decision had the backing of staff committee officers and delegates.
Ms Pilia, who is also the senior KCHFT Unite representative, said she was open to resuming partnership working again, but told trust executives: “I have lost trust and confidence in the ability of [KCHFT] to conduct fair, impartial and no-blame investigations.
“Until there is tangible and credible evidence that racist behaviour at all levels is proactively eliminated, such that perpetrators face real consequences (including to the detriment of their careers) for their actions and are no longer allowed to behave in racist ways with impunity, I take a stand for the hundreds, possibly thousands of KCHFT staff whose voices are not being heard."
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Source: HSJ, 22 October 2020
Old age and having a wide range of initial symptoms increase the risk of "long Covid", say scientists.
The study estimates one in 20 people are sick for least eight weeks. The research at King's College London also showed being female, excess weight and asthma raised the risk.
The aim is to develop an early warning signal that can identify patients who need extra care or who might benefit from early treatment.
The findings come from an analysis of people entering their symptoms and test results into the COVID Symptom Study app.
Scientists scoured the data for patterns that could predict who would get long-lasting illness.
"Having more than five different symptoms in the first week was one of the key risk factors," Dr Claire Steves, from Kings College London, told BBC News.
COVID-19 is more than just a cough - and the virus that causes it can affect organs throughout the body. Somebody who had a cough, fatigue, headache and diarrhoea, and lost their sense of smell, which are all potential symptoms,- would be at higher risk than somebody who had a cough alone. The risk also rises with age, particularly over 50, as did being female.
Dr Steves said: "We've seen from the early data coming out that men were at much more risk of very severe disease and sadly of dying from Covid, it appears that women are more at risk of long Covid."
No previous medical conditions were linked to long Covid except asthma and lung disease.
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Source: BBC News, 21 October 2020
An independent review found that commissioners’ investigation of a young boy’s death was ‘mismanaged’, and heard allegations that the person who coordinated it was bullied over the contents.
The independent review, commissioned by NHS England, has published its final report following an investigation into Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire clinical commissioning group’s LeDer review into the death of Oliver McGowan.
Chaired by Fiona Ritchie, the independent review was commissioned last year after evidence emerged that the CCG had rewritten earlier findings of the review, removing suggestions his death at North Bristol Trust in 2016 was avoidable.
Oliver died in November 2016 after being given anti-psychotic medication against his own and his parents’ wishes and despite medical records showing he had an intolerance to anti-psychotics. He developed severe brain swelling because of the drugs and died.A local LeDer review — part of a programme aimed at improving care based on deaths among people with learning disabilities — was launched in 2017, seven months after his death, by the CCG (then operating as three separate organisations), then published in 2018.
In 2018, a coroner concluded Oliver’s care prior to his death was “appropriate” and made no recommendations. His death is also currently the subject of a police investigation.
The lead reviewer (Ms A) stated in her panel interview that during the time she was undertaking this LeDeR she had felt bullied, overworked and overly stressed by the demands placed on her by the various correspondences with solicitors and her line management. The fact that Ms A believed she was isolated and unsupported during this review illustrates evident failures in the CCG assurance and management processes at the time.
In a final report by the subsequent independent review, published today, the panel led by Ms Ritchie “unanimously” agreed Oliver’s death was “potentially avoidable”.
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Source HSJ, 20 October 2020
More than 200 people who went through hotel quarantine in Victoria, Australia, must be screened for HIV amid fears of cross-contamination from incorrect usage of blood glucose test devices.
Several such devices were used on multiple people in quarantine between 29 March and 20 August, necessitating screenings for blood-borne diseases such as hepatitis B and C and HIV.
These monitors, which take a small sample of blood from a fingertip, are intended for repeated use by only one person. While the needle is changed between usages, microscopic traces of blood can remain within the body of the machine, creating a low clinical risk of cross-contamination and infection.
Safer Care Victoria, the state’s healthcare quality and safety agency, has assured the public there is no risk of COVID-19 spread as the disease is not transmitted by blood.
These devices have since been taken out of circulation.
In a statement, a spokesman for the agency said they have identified 243 people who had been tested by one of the shared machines during the timeframe in question, and will be contacted for screening. Everyone “who had conditions or episodes that may have required the test will also be contacted as a precaution”.
The Victorian premier, Daniel Andrews, labelled the incident a “clinical error that was made some time ago”.
“Safer Care Victoria have made some announcements in relation to a clinical error that was made some time ago, very low risk, but you can’t take any risks with these things. You have to follow them up properly and that’s exactly what has happened,” he said at a press conference on Tuesday.
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Source: The Guardian, 20 October 2020
Ministers have denied care home inspectors access to weekly testing for coronavirus – despite fears they could contribute to the spread of COVID-19 as cases rise across the country, The Independent can reveal.
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) was told by the Department of Health and Social Care last month it could not have access to regular testing for inspection teams as the watchdog prepares for 500 inspections of care homes during the next six weeks.
Officials said the teams, who are assessing care conditions for the vulnerable and elderly, did not get close enough to people to present a risk.
During the first wave of the virus, after Public Health England initially said there was no risk to care homes, an estimated 16,000 residents died from the virus. At the height of the crisis up to 25,000 NHS patients were discharged to care homes by the NHS, with many not having been tested for the virus.
Labour MP Barbara Keeley said: “The refusal of the Department of Health and Social Care to treat CQC inspectors in the same way as other staff going into care homes puts lives at risk.”
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Source: The Independent, 20 October 2020
COVID-19 became a pandemic in March 2020, but the after-effects of it are becoming more apparent as many people are suffering from a wide variety of symptoms months after contracting the disease.
Long COVID – as it is being called – has been affecting some of the earliest COVID-19 sufferers since the first few months of 2020, but little is known about it and the huge variety of symptoms is making research very difficult.
Sky News looks at what the symptoms of long COVID are, how it has affected people's lives, how many are suffering, what treatments there are and how it could affect the economy.
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Source: Sky News, 19 October 2020
Following a damning report by the Care Quality Commission (CQC), the East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust (EEAST) has been placed into special measures.
It comes after inspectors uncovered a culture of bullying and sexual harassment at the trust. As a result of the decision, EEAST will receive enhanced support to improve its services.
A statement from NHS England and NHS Improvement outlined that the Trust would be supported with the appointment of an improvement director, the facilitation of a tailored ‘Freedom to Speak Up’ support package, the arrangement of an external ‘buddying’ with fellow ambulance services and Board development sessions.
This follows a CQC recommendation to place the trust in special measures due to challenges around patient and staff safety concerns, workforce processes, complaints and learning, private ambulance service (PAS) oversight and monitoring, and the need for improvement in the trust’s overarching culture to tackle inappropriate behaviours and encourage people to speak up.
Ann Radmore, East of England Regional Director said, “While the East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust has been working through its many challenges, there are long-standing concerns around culture, leadership and governance, and it is important that the trust supports its staff to deliver the high-quality care that patients deserve."
“We know that the trust welcomes this decision and shares our commitment to reshape its culture and address quality concerns for the benefit of staff, patients and the wider community.”
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Source: Bedford Independent, 19 October 2020
Many unpaid carers looking after vulnerable friends or relatives during the coronavirus crisis say they are worried about how they will cope this winter.
Almost 6,000 unpaid carers completed a Carers UK online questionnaire. Eight in 10 said they had been doing more, with fewer breaks, since the pandemic began - and three-quarters said they were exhausted.
The government said it recognised the "vital role" of unpaid carers.
In the Carers UK survey, 58% of carers said they had seen their physical health affected by caring through the pandemic, while 64% said their mental health had worsened.
People also said day centres and reductions in other services meant the help they once got had reduced or disappeared, leaving many feeling worn out and isolated. Carers UK wants such services up and running again as a matter of urgency.
Helen Walker, chief executive of Carers UK, said: "The majority of carers have only known worry and exhaustion throughout this pandemic.
"They continue to provide extraordinary hours of care, without the usual help from family and friends, and with limited or no support from local services."
"It's no surprise that carers' physical and mental health is suffering, badly. I am deeply concerned that so many carers are on the brink and desperately worried about how they will manage during the next wave of the pandemic."
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Source: BBC News, 20 October 2020
"Long Covid" – the long-lasting impact of coronavirus infection – may be affecting people in four different ways, according to a review, and this could explain why some of those with continuing symptoms are not being believed or treated.
There could be a huge psychological impact on people living with long-term COVID-19, the National Institute for Health Research report says.
They need more support – and healthcare staff require better information.
Most people are told they will recover from mild coronavirus infections within two weeks and from more serious disease within three. But the report says thousands could be living with "ongoing Covid".
Based on interviews with 14 members of a long-Covid support group on Facebook and the most recent published research, the review found recurring symptoms affecting everything from breathing, the brain, the heart and cardiovascular system to the kidneys, the gut, the liver and the skin.
These symptoms may be due to four different syndromes:
permanent organ damage to the lungs and heart
post-intensive-care syndrome
post-viral fatigue syndrome
continuing COVID-19 symptoms
Some of those affected have had a long stay in hospital with severe Covid-19 - but others, who have had a mild infection, have never even been tested or diagnosed.
The review says coming up with a "working diagnosis for ongoing COVID-19" would help people access support.
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Source: BBC News, 15 October 2020
