Arthritis and Musculoskeletal Alliance
Influencing policy and care together for best lifelong musculoskeletal health
What a difference a month makes. When I last wrote an introduction to the ARMA newsletter we were in the run up to an election. I’m not sure anyone expected the result to go quite the way it did. Instead of increasing their majority the Government now has no majority at all and will have to rely on the support of other parties to get their plans through. What will this mean for people with MSK conditions?
In some ways it will be yet another distraction.
British Society for Rheumatology publishes first UK guideline for the management of adults with Primary Sjögrens Syndrome
The first UK guideline on the care of adults with Primary Sjögren’s Syndrome has been published today by the British Society of Rheumatology. The guidelines are accredited by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) which recognises robust, evidence-based and critically evaluated high-quality processes applied to developing a clinical guideline.
Clinical guidelines are particularly important for patients with less common conditions like Sjögren’s because health professionals can lack confidence in managing treatment and care.…
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National Voices’ Wellbeing Our Way programme has published a learning paper reflecting on its use of communities of practice to facilitate change across the voluntary sector over the last 3 years.
With a foreword from @Helen Bevan – and in the spirit of social learning – the publication reflects on our experiences over the last 3 years and shares reflections in order that others can learn from our successes and challenges.
Guest blog by Liz Lingard, NHS RightCare Delivery Partner
Over the past 3 months I have joined the ‘Whole System MSK events’ that ARMA and NHS England have organised as the RightCare speaker. This was an opportunity to clarify the RightCare approach to everyone working across the system and how they can apply this in their local health economies. The core aim of RightCare aligns to what each of the ARMA partners aspires to achieve: ensure the right person is able to access the right care in the right place at the right time, making the best use of available resources to help deliver a sustainable NHS.
Arthritis Research UK have created a new manifesto telling MPs what they can do to ensure that everyone with arthritis can have fuller lives. To make these recommendations a reality, it is vital that MPs across the country support people with arthritis through local and national activity. Prior to the general election we asked every candidate standing to be an Arthritis Champion and had 350 pledges with 24 candidates being elected to parliament. There are also 125 returning MPs who were Arthritis Champions in the previous Parliament.…
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Welcome to two new members of ARMA who have joined this month:
The Society of Musculoskeletal Medicine
The Acupuncture Association of Chartered Physiotherapists
We look forward to working with both organisations.
Wales is the only home nation without a full multidisciplinary paediatric rheumatology service, so many children and families in Wales travel long distances to access vital services. Arthritis Care believes children with arthritis in Wales deserve better.
That is why Arthritis Care Wales, together with the British Society for Rheumatology and the National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society, held a drop-in event in Cardiff on the 28 June 2017 to talk to Assembly Members about the impact of childhood arthritis and the need for better services.…
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Once more NRAS has had a very successful RA awareness week with thousands getting involved in the #behindthesmile campaign. Over 500 awareness packs were sent out in the post and there have been over 1,700 downloads of the posters and infographics from the website.
Our thunderclap went live on the first day of the week and surpassed our target, reaching over 175,000 people, and our RA awareness week frame was used by 2,000 people on Facebook and Twitter.
Click to open the full-size the Behind-the-smile NRAS team photo.…
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The National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society (NRAS) launched its new Work Survey last week. This will investigate the experiences of people with Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) and Adult Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis (JIA), any impact it has had on people’s ability to work and how it affects people in the workplace.
The research will allow NRAS to draw comparisons with its previous Work Survey 10 years ago and enable future campaigning to focus on matters that affect people with RA the most at work.…
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The BASEM and FSEM Sport & Exercise Medicine conference – Bringing us all together, 12-13 October 2017, will be delivering a focused session on Tendons and Tendinopathy.
In this session, hosted by the Faculty of Sport and Exercise Medicine UK, Dr Stephanie Dakin, BVetMed, MRCVS, Botnar Research Centre, Nuffield Department of Orthopaedics, Rheumatology and Musculoskeletal Sciences, University of Oxford, will outline the significance of inflammation to the onset and progression of tendinopathy:
Tendinopathy is a common global disease burden causing pain and prolonged disability.…
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