BMJ Best Practice

Funded by Health Education England, free to all NHS staff and learners

BMJ Best Practice uses the latest evidence-based research, guidelines and expert opinion to offer step-by-step guidance on diagnosis, prognosis, treatment and prevention.

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Tackling health inequalities: seven priorities for the NHS – The King’s Fund

Drawing on The King’s Fund’s five-year programme of work on health inequalities and tackling the worst health outcomes, which includes insights from stakeholders, partners and people with lived experience, this long read outlines what we think the anticipated 10-year health plan should focus on to help the NHS do more to tackle these challenges.

Tackling Health Inequalities | Seven Priorities For The NHS | The King’s Fund (kingsfund.org.uk)

Making Every Contact Count September 2024

The most recent Make Every Contact count public heath bulletin looking at latest evidence around smoking cessation, alcohol, healthy weight, healthy eating and physical exercise is now available. The bulletin is produced by Lancashire and South Cumbria NHS FT Library staff. If you cannot access any of the articles included in the bulletin please contact academic.library@lscft.nhs.uk.

Smoking Cessation

Alcohol

Healthy Weight

Healthy Eating

Physical Activity

Implementation Guidance

Psychological Therapies for Severe Mental Health Problems

Source: KnowledgeShare

Psychological therapies for severe mental health problems: implementation guidance 2024.
NHS England; 2024.

This guidance is for NHS-commissioned mental health provider organisations, integrated care boards (ICBs), regional NHS England offices, and chief psychological professions officers in mental health trusts. It aims to support mental health providers to deliver the NHS long term plan objective to increase access to psychological therapies for people with severe mental health problems, as part of a wider transformation of adult and older adult community mental health services.
Freely available online

Medical emergencies in eating disorders

Guidance on recognition and management

Source: The King’s Fund

This report finds that signs that someone with an eating disorder is dangerously ill are often missed by health care professionals due to lack of guidance and training. The research finds that hospital admissions for eating disorders have increased by 84 per cent in the past five years, reaching a total of 24,268 admissions. Children and young people with eating disorders are the worst affected, with a rise of 90 per cent in the five-year period. This guidance is aimed at frontline staff so that people with eating disorders needing urgent care can be identified and treated earlier.

BMJ Best Practice

Funded by Health Education England, free to all NHS staff and learners

BMJ Best Practice uses the latest evidence-based research, guidelines and expert opinion to offer step-by-step guidance on diagnosis, prognosis, treatment and prevention.

Click here and enter your OpenAthens username and password to sign in. If you are a new user, you will need to register for a BMJ Best Practice personal account.

You can use your personal account to download the free BMJ Best Practice app for access anywhere, anytime, even offline.

Eating Disorders

Advice for eating out with calorie labelling

From April 2022, new laws in England will mean many businesses that serve food will have to put information about calorie content on their menus. Many people with eating disorders will find this makes an already challenging situation harder.

Read this guidance from BEAT for support.

Covid 19

Current awareness updates

Designated settings for people discharged to a care home.
Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC); 2022.
[Guidance on the designated settings scheme for people discharged from hospital to a care home with a positive coronavirus (COVID-19) test (UPDATED: 07 February 2022 The ‘designated settings’ guidance has been updated throughout in line with the latest clinical advice from UKHSA. This update reflects the change in isolation period in care settings from 14 to 10 days for cases of COVID-19. It also provides information on how individuals can end their isolation before day 10)]

Patient experience before the omicron wave: the storm before the storm.
Patients Association; 2022.
[This report, based on a survey of more than 1,000 UK patients conducted over a month just before Christmas 2021, finds the disruption to health and care services caused by the pandemic is profound and long-term.]

COVID-19 Schools Infection Survey, England: attitudes to vaccines and preventative measures, November to December 2021.
Office for National Statistics (ONS); 2022.
[Initial insights from the first round of questionnaire data collected as part of the Schools Infection Survey. Questionnaires are completed by parents of participating children, secondary school aged children and headteachers. Topics cover vaccine sentiment, ventilation in schools and preventative measures implemented in schools.]

Covid 19

Current awareness updates

COVID-19: letter to patients on end of shielding programme.
UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA); 2021.
[Reference-only version of letter from the government to patients on the end of the shielding programme.]

COVID-19 rapid guideline: managing the long-term effects of COVID-19.
National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE); 2021.
[This guideline covers identifying, assessing and managing the long-term effects of COVID-19, often described as ‘long COVID’. On 11 November, NICE made new recommendations and updated existing recommendations on identification; planning care; multidisciplinary rehabilitation; follow up, monitoring and discharge; and service organisation. NICE also updated the list of common symptoms, emphasising that these may be different for children.]

COVID-19 booster vaccine programme for winter 2021 to 2022: JCVI statement, November 2021.
Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC); 2021.
[This statement sets out further advice from JCVI on extension of the booster programme to revaccinate adults aged 40 to 49 years against COVID-19. The main aim of this booster vaccination programme is to reduce deaths, serious disease and hospitalisations from COVID-19 over the 2021 to 2022 winter period and through 2022.]

Why we think you should say yes to the COVID-19 vaccine.
Leeds Clinical Commissioning Group; 2021.
[An information leaflet about the COVID-19 vaccine where clinicians and faith leaders highlight the importance of having the vaccine. The leaflet has been translated into the following languages: Amharic, Arabic, Bengali, Czech, Farsi, Kurdish Sorani, Polish, Punjabi, Romanian, Slovak, Tigrinya and Urdu. Audio versions of the leaflet are available for each of those languages.]

No one wants to see my baby: challenges to building back better for babies.
Parent-Infant Foundation; 2021.
[This report explores the continued impact of Covid-19 on babies. It consists of a survey of professionals, in-depth studies with 11 families and a review of the literature, conducted with partner organisations Home-Start and Best Beginnings. The report shows that many services across the UK are not operating as they were before the pandemic, and babies and their families are missing out as a result.]

Essential and Invisible: Filipino irregular migrants in the UK’s ongoing COVID-19 crisis.
Kanlungan Filipino Consortium; 2021.
[For many in the United Kingdom, it might feel as if the “crisis” of the COVID-19 pandemic is coming to an end. Yet for irregular migrants, the pandemic has become a protracted struggle to survive. This report is based on interviews with Filipino irregular migrants based in the UK conducted in Spring 2021, compared to the same interviewees’ responses in Spring 2020.]

Coronavirus: support for landlords and tenants.
House of Commons Library; 2021.
[This briefing explains measures during the coronavirus outbreak to help renting households retain their homes. It covers calls for more assistance to prevent evictions and homelessness.]