Respiratory Service

Our Respiratory Service provides the best possible care for children with breathing problems.

We look after children from around the UK with a wide range of problems ranging from asthma and cystic fibrosis to those requiring ventilation at home. Hundreds of patients are referred to us each year.

We pride ourselves on being at the forefront of developments in respiratory medicine which is underpinned by a very strong commitment to research that contributes to continual improvements in clinical care. This research has led directly to changes in national and international guidelines.

Experience

Within in the team we have very experienced consultants, nurse specialists, specialist physiotherapists and excellent respiratory physiologists.

Many children with respiratory problems also have other medical conditions and we work very closely with other departments including thoracic surgery, ENT, gastroenterology and immunology as well as providing advice to other departments including the intensive care and oncology units.

State of the art equipment

The department has state of the art diagnostic services including an extremely well-equipped respiratory physiology unit, sleep disorder breathing laboratory and imaging. It undertakes more that 150 bronchoscopies a year.

Clinics

• general respiratory clinics are held daily
• sleep clinics for sleep disordered breathing and other sleep disorders are held weekly on Monday afternoons
• we hold transition clinics with the Royal Hallamshire Hospital
• we also have Chronic Lung Disease, Home Ventilation and Difficult Asthma clinics and have a fortnightly physiological assessment clinic

BreathWorks clinic

We are very proud of our BreathWorks clinic which is unique in the UK in dealing with children with dysfunctional breathing. The clinic provides specialist assessment with ENT where required, as well as an individual treatment programme for patients with breathing problems that are limiting their ability to perform at their best.

The department runs a national conference and is very active in research in this area.

Dr Kelechi Ugonna and our specialist respiratory physiologists have expertise in respiratory physiology related to sport with special focus on providing assessments for elite athletes.

Difficult asthma clinic

The Difficult Asthma clinic provides multidisciplinary assessment and treatment for children in whom standard asthma treatments are not sufficient.

Our department has been a leading international centre in research into the causes and treatment of chronic cough and ‘difficult’ asthma.

We are the only centre in the UK with a dedicated clinic for children and adolescents with breathing difficulties that limit their ability to play sport or music to their full potential.