Following the success of the Essex Vax Van, community providers, working as a Mid and South Essex Community Collaborative, are leading an outreach model to give residents in hard-to-reach areas access to high quality proactive and preventative care for post COVID syndrome and its symptoms.
One size doesn’t fit all and reaching into communities that often face the poorest health outcomes to prevent ill-health is crucial. This programme offers health checks and diagnostic tests in this mobile clinic for adults, children and young people, including blood pressure, heart rate, oxygen saturation, spirometry and other tests for breathlessness, 6-lead electrocardiography.
The team is also working with local teams to provide information on smoking cessation, social prescribing and other local services. Patients already referred to the long COVID team can be booked into appointments at the van, as well as being able to ‘walk-in’ to the mobile clinic. People can talk to the team about how to recognise the symptoms of long COVID. What the mobile clinic offers is not a replacement for a full assessment for long COVID, but it does start a conversation that may be followed by a referral to a GP.