The findings have implications for primary care in terms of unmet needs in the early stages of the condition and pulmonary rehabilitation programmes in terms of providing individual counselling and ongoing peer group support to aid disease self-management.

No abstract

No abstract

Committee has recommended the axing of funding for a research project which has revealed links between legislators and tobacco interests, and brought damaging internal tobacco industry documents to the attention of the public.

Purpose COVID-19 brought about unprecedented challenges to healthcare, with nuclear medicine (NM) being no exception. The British Nuclear Medicine Society (BNMS) COVID-19 survey assessed the impact of the first wave of pandemic on NM services in the UK. With COVID-19 resurge compounded by seasonal winter pressures, we reflect and share lessons learnt from the first wave of pandemic to guide future strategy. Methods A questionnaire consisting of 34 questions was sent out to all BNMS members over 2 weeks in May 2020, to evaluate the impact of ‘lockdown’. Results One hundred thirty-eight members (92 sites) from a multidisciplinary background responded. There was a 65% reduction across all services; 97.6% of respondents reported some reduction in diagnostic procedures and 71.3% reduction in therapies; 85% worked with a reduced workforce. The North East of England, Greater London and South East and Wessex were most affected by staff absences. The North East reported the highest number of COVID-19 positive staff; London reported the greatest lack of testing. The reported time required to clear the backlog was 1–12 months. Seventy-one percent of participants used BNMS COVID-19 guidance. Conclusion The first wave caused a major disruption of NM service delivery and impacted on the workforce. The departmental strategies should tailor services to evolving local and regional differences in prevalence of COVID-19. A blanket shutdown of services with a ‘one size fits all’ strategy would likely have a severe impact on future delivery of NM and health services in general. Timely testing of staff and patients remains of paramount importance.