Category: Arthritis News

NICE Quality Standard – Rheumatoid arthritis in over 16s

In January 2020, NICE published an update on the Quality Standard for rheumatoid arthritis in over 16s (QS33). This quality standard covers assessing, diagnosing and managing rheumatoid arthritis in over 16s. It describes high-quality care in priority areas for improvement.

NICE thanked organisations that submitted comments during the consultation period. All consultation comments were considered by the advisory committee (QSAC) and are documented in the minutes of this meeting.

Also available on the website is a summary of the consultation comments prepared by the NICE quality standards team and the full set of consultation comments.…

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Third APPG for Axial Spondyloarthritis

The third meeting of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Axial Spondyloarthritis took place on 29 January at Portcullis House in Westminster. The meeting focussed on the delay to diagnosis and included the launch of our Freedom of Information Inquiry report.

Huge thanks go to our speakers: Zoe Clark who gave an emotional account of her seven year wait for a diagnosis; Dr James Prior from Keele University who summarised the latest research into the area; Rebecca Adshead, physiotherapist at Whipp’s Cross Hospital, who gave an example of good practice, presenting on how the delay to diagnosis had been reduced locally; and finally Dr Raj Sengupta from the Royal National Hospital for Rheumatic Diseases presented the draft Gold Standard to Diagnosis.…

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Mental and physical health: practical ways to improve care

Two new outputs have been published by the Q Lab and Mind on improving care for people living with both mental and physical health problems:

  1. A practical guide to improving care that includes ideas, challenges to prepare for and examples to learn from.
  2. A set of service principles that can be used to inform decisions about improving, designing or commissioning services across mental health and persistent back and neck pain.

The outputs are a result of the 12-month partnership between the Q Improvement Lab (part of Q, delivered by the Health Foundation) and Mind – the mental health charity – on improving care across mental and physical health.…

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MSK health is as important as heart health

by Sue Brown, CEO ARMA

Happy New Year to all our readers. The start of the new year is a time to reflect on our successes in 2019 and to look forward to what can be done in 2020.

Some of my highlights from 2019 were the annual lecture on mental health and MSK, our roundtables on pain and on mental health and our webinars. The webinars have been very popular with thousands of people watching them live or in recording.…

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HMSA out and about

HMSA Chair, Hannah Ensor, was at St Thomas’s Hospital in November, manning an HMSA stand to make contact with a number of staff and patients. Hannah spread the HMSA’s awareness and positive self-management approach, and as always, the message was well received and the HMSA gained several new professional followers as a result!

January #HypnOT event

In January HMSA has a new live event for members. #HypnOT is the brainchild of HMSA’s resident Occupational Therapist Jo Southall, and Kim Clayden, our Social Media Manager and a qualified Solution-Focused Psychotherapy & Clinical Hypnotherapist.…

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How integrated care is set to improve outcomes for those with comorbidities

Guest blog by William Pett – Senior Policy Advisor, NHS Confederation

As people grow older, health conditions often become both more complex and chronic. Evidence shows that rates of those living with multimorbidity rise significantly with age; a recent study revealed that 30% of adults aged 45 to 64 years report at least two chronic conditions, increasing to 65% of adults aged 65 to 84 years and more than 80% for those above 85 years old.

For older people living with multimorbidity, musculoskeletal conditions are common.…

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General Election 2019 arthritis pledges

Versus Arthritis would like to thank everyone who supported their aims during the election campaign:

  • Almost 2,000 people asked their candidates to pledge to champion the needs of people with arthritis;
  • 6,000 emails were sent to candidates across the four nations;
  • Hundreds of candidates tweeted and emailed their support.

People can still add their voice by sending a message to the MP in their constituency about what it’s like to live with arthritis and why they need to take action. Visit the General Election page on the VA website.

NICE guideline on digital and mobile health interventions

NICE is developing a guideline on Behaviour change: digital and mobile health interventions and ARMA has been invited to register as a stakeholder.

If your organisation would like to register as a stakeholder for this guideline, please complete the online registration form which can be accessed via the topic webpage.

Organisations registered as stakeholders can comment on the draft scope and draft guideline, and contribute in other ways. Registered stakeholders will have the opportunity to comment on the draft guideline during consultation and all comments received from registered stakeholders will be considered and responded to individually.…

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PCRMM welcomes Lucy Douglas as the new President

You may have noticed that the PCR Society is now PCRMM – Primary Care Rheumatology & Musculoskeletal Medicine Society. The Society feels that this new name encompasses all of the conditions covered and will encourage more GPs, physios and AHPs to both join the Society and attend the conferences.

The PCRMM is pleased to welcome Lucy Douglas as the new President of the PCRMM. Elected at the recent AGM, she is a GP with a special interest in MSK, primary care rheumatology, and MSK ultrasound, currently working in East Lancashire and West Yorkshire.…

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