The Operating Theatre Journal March 2022

www.vanguardhealthcare.co.uk
Cardiff and Vale University Health Board introduces ophthalmic hub to help combat elective care backlog
Leading medical infrastructure provider Vanguard Healthcare Solutions
has created and installed a new ophthalmic hub at the University
Hospital of Wales in Cardiff to help tackle the region’s acute care
backlog.
The bespoke mixed-modality facility includes two mobile laminar flow
theatres and a modular ward and staff welfare facility and it has been
installed by Vanguard to help the Health Board meet increasing demand
for essential procedures.
As a result of the damaging impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and the
numerous lockdowns that followed, the UK faces its biggest backlog
in elective care since the NHS was first introduced, with 5.8 million
waiting for routine surgery.
The Cardiff and Vale University Health Board is committed to addressing
this backlog through the opening of its new ophthalmic hub which
should efficiently provide life-changing cataract surgery for patients.
Working alongside the Health Board’s team, Vanguard designed a
bespoke solution to meet the hospital’s and wider area’s needs. The
hub is made up of two Vanguard mobile laminar flow operating theatres.
A modular unit, designed, built and installed by Vanguard, houses a
reception, consultation room, staff facilities and short-stay ward. This
allows the entire patient journey to take place within the hub, with no
need for patients to visit the main hospital building.
Surgery will take place in one of the two theatres which each include
an anaesthetic room, operating theatre and a recovery room.
The facility will be on site until January 2023 and will support the
Health Board through efficiently carrying out ophthalmic procedures
and will be operating 5 days a week.
Maxine Lawson. Account Manager for the South at Vanguard Healthcare
Solutions said: “The use of this mixed-modality solution in Cardiff is an
example of how mobile and modular solutions are an excellent way to
help healthcare providers meeting demands as the need for additional
capacity continues to rise. The modular section of the facility provides
additional space for staff welfare areas, an area that we were keen to
include in this contract.
“We are delighted to have worked with Cardiff and Vale University
Health Board on this project, assisting in reducing the elective care
backlog in Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan”.
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Handheld breathing device could reduce breathlessness
and improve physical fitness in long COVID patients
New research presented at The Physiological Society’s Long COVID: Mechanisms, Risk Factors, and Recovery during February shows that a small
handheld breathing device helped reduced breathlessness and improved physical fitness of people with long COVID. The low cost, home-based
rehabilitation programme increased the strength of respiratory muscles speeding up the rate of recovery from COVID-19.
Approximately, one in ten people recovering from COVID-19 experience long COVID (reports on this figure still vary), which negatively impacts
quality of life. Many people with long COVID feel breathless, tired and can have difficulties performing basic tasks of daily living.
The new intervention improved respiratory health and fitness levels of people with long COVID by training the muscles that you use to breath.
Training the breathing muscles strengthens them just like other muscles in the body. Participants felt less breathless, stronger, fitter, and could
move around more easily, similar to pre-COVID levels.
148 participants took part in the study. They were recruited through social media and included a few discharged hospital patients. They were
randomised into intervention and control groups.
Participants were provided with their own small handheld device to do breathing exercises three times a week for about 20 minutes over eight
weeks. They would breathe into the device as deeply as they could for as long as they could. The device would then feedback to the user. The
results were compared with participants in a control group who had no intervention.
Breathlessness was reduced by 33%, twice the level considered clinically meaningful, in the intervention group compared with the control group.
Estimated fitness increased by approximately 10% and respiratory strength increased by approximately 36% in the intervention group compared to
control group. The health improvements were 2-14 times greater for the intervention group compared to the control group.
The intervention was developed by a UK-wide team of breathing experts, who have worked with people with many types of respiratory conditions
such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, asthma and cystic fibrosis. The clinical benefits suggest the programme should be considered for
wider implementation as part of COVID-19 recovery strategies.
One-to-one interviews were carried out to evaluate participants’ experiences of COVID, recovery from it and the impact of the inspiratory muscle
training. Researchers assessed breathlessness, quality of life, the strength of the respiratory muscles and estimated aerobic fitness.
The study was conducted during various phases of UK-wide COVID-19 restrictions and lockdowns. Conducting it entirely remotely via online video
conferencing limited the robustness of the measures the research team could use.
Professor Melitta McNarry, University of Swansea, UK, the presenter and lead author of this research said: “It’s vital we develop safe and effective
home-based rehabilitation methods to help people recover quickly and fully from COVID-19. Breathing muscle training enabled people to return to
activities they had been unable to do for weeks or months, providing physical and mental health benefits. The unsupervised nature of this method
and the relatively low cost of the devices could be used to ease the strain on the NHS.”
Further funding is needed to implement this rehabilitation programme in collaboration with healthcare providers to assess its feasibility in a realworld
setting.
Further reading: https://bit.ly/OTJPTS322
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