Specialised Rheumatology Centre
As an NHS England Specialised Rheumatology Centre for Connective Tissue Disease (CTD) and Vasculitis we provide secondary and tertiary level care for patients with these conditions.
We have well established links to other services with expertise in multi-system inflammatory disease including in nephrology, respiratory, obstetrics, otorhinolaryngology, ophthalmology, oral medicine, neurology, dermatology, vascular surgery and intensive care. Specialist combined clinics run for patients with connective tissue disease related skin disease, pulmonary hypertension and interstitial lung disease. We also run regional combined obstetric clinics and a regular prenatal planning clinic for patients with these conditions.
We host the monthly regional multidisciplinary team meeting to discuss complex cases and ratify the use of high cost drugs.
On-call consultant led rapid access service
The connective tissue diseases and vasculitides are heterogeneous conditions and can have a wide range of presentations, from insidious to fulminant organ and even life-threatening disease.
If you suspect a patient has a new presentation of vasculitis or organ threatening CTD, please refer urgently to rheumatology during office hours, or general medicine via the admissions suite or Accident and Emergency with plan for rheumatology referral.
There is a rheumatology specialist trainee on call from 9:00am to 7:00pm weekdays and 9:00am to 1:00pm weekends who can give telephone advice and coordinate an urgent admission or urgent out-patient review. Contact is via our switchboard on 0191 2336161.
Advice and Guidance should be used for questions about any less acutely unwell patient. Please see our separate information section for patients with suspected Giant Cell Arteritis for information about our fast track pathway.
Referrals
Please send referrals via eREFERAL using the Suspected Autoimmune CTD or Vasculitis proforma. Please review the Choosing Wisely recommendations before testing autoantibodies.
Rheumatology-Suspected Auto-immune Connective Tissue (CTD) or VasculitisChoosing Wisely recommendations archive – AOMRC
Autoantibodies should not be used as screening tests for patients with non-specific symptoms. Please consider using advice and guidance as an alternative. It is important to have a clear history, examination findings, recorded BP and urine dipstick result when making a referral or seeking advice to allow appropriate triage or guidance.
Research
We integrate high quality research into our service and lead several national and international research studies. Patients attending our service will have opportunities to be involved in research, ranging from entry onto national registries, basic science and experimental medicine studies to clinical trials.
The team
You can see a list of our Consultants who each have a special interest in CTD at the bottom of this page. We also have two specialist CTD nurses and access to specialist occupational therapy.
Contact us
Advice line 0191 213796
