Long Covid: Health Services

(asked on 7th July 2021) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to promote a multi-disciplinary approach to long-COVID in the NHS to ensure patients have access to joined-up care across multiple services.


Answered by
Lord Bethell Portrait
Lord Bethell
This question was answered on 20th July 2021

NHS England published Long COVID: the NHS plan for 2021/22 on 15 June. Within the Plan, a multi-disciplinary care pathway is outlined as a principle of care for ‘long’ COVID-19, with the expectations that services must offer multidisciplinary, physical, cognitive, psychological and psychiatric assessments. The paediatric hubs also announced as part of the Plan will consist of multidisciplinary teams which can provide assessment services and remote support to other clinicians to ensure ongoing holistic support. The Plan also outlined that by mid-July, healthcare systems should provide fully staffed ‘long’ COVID-19 service plans covering the whole pathway from primary care through to specialist care using multidisciplinary teams. A copy of Long COVID: the NHS plan for 2021/22 is attached.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence’s COVID-19 rapid guideline: managing the long-term effects of COVID-19, states that access to multidisciplinary services should be provided for assessing physical and mental health symptoms and carrying out further tests and investigations and that integrated, multidisciplinary rehabilitation services, based on local need and resources should also be provided. A copy of the guideline is attached.

Reticulating Splines