SERVICES
STAGE 1
You can book directly or be referred to our dedicated team of General Practitioners who will undertake a full medical assessment. The consultation will last an hour and include a medical history, examination, Covid panel blood tests and an ECG (heart tracing). Depending on the nature of your symptoms you may then be referred to a single specialist who may undertake further investigations. Alternatively if your case is more complex, you will be referred to a General Physician (stage 2).
STAGE 2
For those patients requiring a multi-disciplinary approach and bespoke management programme, your care will be overseen by a General Physician. Together you will create a treatment plan which may include a course of physiotherapy, further investigations and identification of any other specialists required. Your progress will be discussed in monthly multi-disciplinary team meetings and you will have your own hand-held notes which will contain your medical information.
STAGE 3
Over the course of several months you will be regularly reviewed and your management plan updated as required. We will be using a variety of tools to assess your progress including review of treatment goals, questionnaires and if necessary medical tests to confirm resolution of covid-19 complications. You will also have access to advice and given information about organisations that may be able to help you further.
GENERAL PRACTICE
At the Guildford Private General Practice, we are committed to delivering holistic and compassionate care to all of our patients and have made it our aim to learn as much as we can about the new condition of Long Covid as it has developed over the past year. We realised early on that the challenges faced by patients after recovery from acute Covid 19 infection are often multiple and complex and needed a management approach specifically designed to be adaptable and personalised to each patient with the involvement of several different specialists with a generalist overview. We have collaborated with our consultant colleagues to share knowledge in teaching sessions and are excited to develop a brand new service for our patients.
As GPs we are in the privileged position of having the opportunity to comprehensively assess each of our patients who have symptoms attributable to Covid 19. We all have extensive experience of health screening as well as general practice and are used to comprehensively assessing the whole patient and considering both physical and psychological symptoms. Based at the Mount Alvernia Hospital, we are able to offer long appointments to get a good overall picture of any patient’s problems and are lucky to have the added benefits of rapid access to pathology and radiology on site as well as direct communication with our consultant colleagues.
As a patient interested in assessment for Long Covid, you would initially be assessed by one of our GPs. This would be a chance to discuss any symptoms you have, which can actually involve many different systems, some of which may be preventing normal activities, some of which may come and go and some of which may be causing significant distress. We will take the time to listen to your story and arrange some screening tests which can obviously be expanded to include anything specific to you that we collaboratively feel would be helpful. We can then take the time to work out what additional support you might need and we can discuss your potentially complex bundle of symptoms at the multidisciplinary team meetings we hold with the consultants within the long covid clinic so that we can come up with a management plan to help you through the condition.
We know that Long Covid can be extremely challenging to patients and their families and we do hope our service can help to provide appropriate medical treatment, practical advice and support and hopefully some light at the end of the tunnel.
PHYSIOTHERAPY
We are a team of very experienced, motivated Senior Physiotherapists based at Mount Alvernia with a special interest in long covid. We are aware the understanding about long covid and the research is constantly evolving but we aim to offer an individual treatment package that takes into account your specific symptoms and goals but also incorporates the most up to date evidence. We will continue to adapt our approach as the evidence develops.
Long covid can present in many different ways. Once you have been referred to us by either the GP or Specialist who will have carried out any essential tests, we will do a thorough examination to establish how long covid is affecting you with your day to day activities and establish what you would like to achieve so together we can establish some short and longer term goals.
Our Specialist Team can offer a range of treatments including respiratory exercises, advice regarding return to activity that may include a graded exercise approach and pacing advice along with treatment to address specific musculoskeletal conditions. If appropriate we can incorporate a CBT based approach. This will be a personalised service that will be continually reassessed and modified accordingly. We also have a well equipped gym environment with an antigravity treadmill which can be an excellent way to increase exercise tolerance gradually and decrease the load through the body's joints.
CLINICIANS
We have a team of dedicated specialists in various fields of medicine including General medicine, Cardiology, Respiratory medicine, Diabetes & Endocrinology, Neurology, Ear Nose and Throat, Dermatology, Rheumatology and Psychiatry. Between us, we have significant experience in managing patients with Covid-19 and are all passionate about improving the health and wellbeing of patients with Long Covid Syndrome.