Clinical Leadership Group

The Clinical Leadership Group of the IPIC (International Post Covid & Post Infection Conditions) Society brings together a multidisciplinary team of highly experienced clinicians and allied health professionals who are recognised leaders in the fields of post-Covid and post-infection conditions.

The IPIC Society and the Clinical Leadership Group are a working group of the British Society of Physical and Rehabilitation Medicine, contributing specialist knowledge and evidence informed perspectives to support advancement of best practice. Members of the Clinical Leadership Group are committed to fostering multidisciplinary collaboration, supporting translation of emerging evidence into practice and driving improvements in the field of post infection conditions.

The Clinical Leadership Group currently meets monthly.

Dr Anirban Gupta

Society Co-Chair & Primary Care Lead

Dr Gupta graduated in 2001 and did a post-graduate qualification in respiratory medicine before becoming a GP. A Fellow of the Royal College of General Practitioners, he works in South West London and Surrey Downs, and is a Clinical Lead in the NHS South West London Integrated Care System (SWL ICS). He contributed towards setting up the local system response in the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic and became Post Covid clinical lead – both regionally for NHS England (London) as well as for SWL ICS.

As a GP, he’s passionate about helping people living with Long Covid. In his clinical lead role, he has focussed on the community impact of the condition, especially on reducing inequalities and improving access for communities formerly termed ‘hard to reach’ but perhaps more aptly described as ‘easy to ignore’. He has worked on revealing and tackling significant unmet need and prevalence gaps, and has collaborated with colleagues across health and social care and the voluntary sector to enable this.

He co-presented a poster with Public Health at the National Long Covid Conference in 2023 that showcased the challenges and potential solutions. In his regional London lead role, he has led on developing a maturity matrix to help ICS partners work on these – which can also be used for other diseases with similar population-level issues.

Other Responsibilities:

Working as a community doctor in urgent care response and virtual ward services
London Fast Track Cities South West London HIV GP co-champion

Ms Rebecca Livingston

Society Co-Chair & Physiotherapist

Rebecca Livingston is the Clinical Lead Physiotherapist for the Post COVID service at the University College London Hospital (UCLH) in the UK. Established in May 2020, this was the UK's first Post COVID service. Rebecca founded and co-chairs the Allied Health and Therapies Long Covid Network, a national clinical network supporting almost 1000 clinicians working in Long Covid services across the country and abroad. She was appointed by NHS England and Improvement as the Post COVID specialty adviser for London and supported delivery of NHSE’s regional programme.

Rebecca was part of the World Health Organisation guidance development group for Rehabilitation in Post COVID Condition, and contributed to the updated NHSE Post COVID Commissioning Guidance. She has written and delivered teaching and training on Long Covid rehabilitation, and leads on transformation projects to deliver innovative solutions to care.

Research interests

Rebecca also regularly engages with national media to improve understanding of post Covid care. During the peaks of the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK, Rebecca worked in critical care, including on an acute CPAP unit. Rebecca is also the Clinic Lead Physiotherapist for Outpatient Respiratory Physiotherapy, Medicine, Urgent and Emergency Services at UCLH.

Dr Melissa Heightman

NHS England Representative

Dr Heightman specialises in interstitial lung disease and integrated respiratory medicine and is the deputy clinical divisional director for medical specialities at UCLH. She qualified from the University of Cambridge in 2000, and trained in respiratory medicine at the Brompton Hospital and in North London. She held a Wellcome Trust Clinical Training Fellowship from 2007 to 2011.

Dr Heightman supports community respiratory services in Camden and Islington and works closely with primary care to support management of patients with respiratory disease at practice level. She is working with NCL CCG to develop pathways to improve the quality of respiratory care in the Integrated Care System. She is a member of the clinical leadership group of the London Respiratory Clinical Network which develops guidance for London in meeting respiratory priorities in the NHS long term plan and relating to the COVID19 pandemic. Dr Heightman has been clinical lead for the COVID follow up service at the trust which is a multiprofessional and multispeciality service which integrates with community assessment and community rehabilitation services. She is a member of the NHSE task force considering COVID follow up service development and the NICE guideline group looking at management of the long term effects of COVID19 . She has a broad interest in transformation of outpatient services and in developing new models of care for long term conditions across the integrated care system.

Specialties:

Dr Heightman supports clinical research within the Interstitial Lung Disease service which recruits to a number of clinical trials as well as supporting UCL respiratory based research into mechanisms undelying development of pulmonary fibrosis. She is co-applicant on an NIHR funded project looking at the effectiveness of supported self management for recovery of COVID using digital tools. There is a broad research platform developing around mechanisms underlying post-COVID syndrome and in evaluating best models of investigation and care which the UCLH service is contributing to actively.

Publications

Dr Heightman has co-authored the primary care community resource pack for use during COVID 19 (July 2020, London Clinical Respiratory Network).
‘Long-COVID’: A cross-sectional study of persisting symptoms, biomarker and imaging abnormalities following hospitalisation for COVID-19. Thorax in press 2020. Swapna Mandal PhD1, Joseph Barnett FRCR2, Simon E Brill PhD1, Jeremy S Brown FRCP3,4, Emma K Denneny MBBS4, Samanjit S Hare FRCR2, Melissa Heightman FRCP4, Toby E Hillman FRCP4, Joseph Jacob MD(Res)5,6, Hannah C Jarvis MRCP1, Marc C I Lipman MD1,3, Sindhu B Naidu MBBS1, Arjun Nair MD6, Joanna C Porter FRCP3,4, Gillian S Tomlinson PhD4,7, John R Hurst FRCP
Heightman M, Williamson A, Dzingai, J, Sennett K, Lenders J: “Development of improved models of COPD care with the evolution of the QIST in an inner city borough” British Thoracic Society Meeting 2018
Heightman, M, Dullaghan D, Rafferty A, Jones E, Dzingai J, Stern M : “Measuring the Value of an Integrated Respiratory Consultant supported Community Respiratory (CORE) multidisciplinary team in a deprived inner city area: Achieving parity in quality of care for housebound patients and those not accessing specialist services” Dec 2015 Thorax 70 (Suppl 3): A88- A89
Heightman, M, Restrick R, Stern M: Developing the first UK integrated respiratory registrar role in an inner city integrated care organisation Clinical Medicine 2015 Jun;15 Suppl 3:s29. doi: 10.7861/clinmedicine.15-3-s29. Epub 2015 May 29.
Heightman M, Booth HL, Laurent, G, Hill M R: "TIMP3 protects against inflammatory processes in Interstitial Lung Disease” Nov 2010 Thorax 65 (Suppl 4): A1-A2

Dr Harsha Master

Post Covid Service Expert

Dr Master works as the GP Medical Lead in the Covid Rehab Assessment and Rehabilitation Service at Hertfordshire Community Trust, which was one of the first clinics to be set up nationally in May 2020.

She co-led and co-designed a new multidisciplinary team COVID-19 rehabilitation pathway, which has evolved to deliver coordinated, holistic care, involving a combination of medical assessment and rehabilitation, working closely with colleagues in acute hospitals, social care, mental health, and the voluntary sector. It has been advocated as an exemplar model as it works across the community, primary care, and secondary care interface.

She is passionate about collaborative working and is keen to further develop integrated holistic models of care to support complex illness, with a patient centred focus.

She is also enthusiastic about teaching and education on Long Covid and has delivered a series of educational webinars on Long Covid to primary, secondary and community care colleagues, as well as providing guidance, support and education to those working in sports, social prescribers, local businesses and employers within Hertfordshire.

Nationally she has presented at the RCGP conference, MIMS Learning Live and Guidelines live and at the Long Covid and POTS Masterclass.

Dr Master graduated from Imperial College, School of Medicine in 2003 with an interest in infectious disease, completing a BSc in Infection and Immunity in 2000.

She is a General Practitioner by background and completed her GP training in 2008.

Research

PI in the LOCOMOTION study – an NIHR funded research project looking to identify and provide guidance on the best way to treat and support patients with Long Covid

Publications

Guidelines in practice, Dec 2020 – Top Tips in Managing Long Covid. http://www.guidelinesinpractice.co.uk/infection/top-tips-managing-long-covid/455742.article
A learning module for MIMS on Long-Covid management, February 2021. https://www.mimslearning.co.uk/courses/guidance-update-long-covid-assessment-and-management
Guidelines in practice, June 2022 - Draw expert opinion to optimise care for Long Covid. https://www.guidelinesinpractice.co.uk/infection/draw-on-expert-opinion-to-optimise-care-for-long-covid/456989.article
BMJ Practice Pointer February 2023 - Orthostatic tachycardia after Covid-19. http://www.bmj.com/content/380/bmj-2022-073488

Prof Manoj Sivan MD FRCP Edin

BSPRM Representative

Prof Sivan graduated in Medicine in 1999. He is the UK’s first NIHR Academic Clinical Fellow in Rehabilitation Medicine in Leeds (2007-2012) and completed his MD (Research) in Rehabilitation Robotics in the Academic Department of Rehabilitation Medicine (ADRM) at the University of Leeds.

Appointed as a Consultant in Rehabilitation Medicine at Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust in 2012, he joined the Human Pain Research Group (HPRG) at the University of Manchester as an Honorary Senior Lecturer. HPRG is a collaboration between pain researchers from Univeristies of Leeds, Manchester and Liverpool.

Since 2017, Prof Sivan has been in a clinical academic role as Associate Clinical Professor in Rehabilitation Medicine with Leeds Institute for Rheumatic and Musculoskeletal Medicine (LIRMM) at the University of Leeds and an NHS Consultant at Leeds Teaching Hospitals Trust and Leeds Community Healthcare Trust. He continues his role as Leeds lead for the HPRG.

Other responsibilities:

President of the British Society of Physical and Rehabilitation Medicine BSPRM (https://www.bsprm.org.uk/) 2022-2024
UK representative for European Society of Physical and Rehabilitation Medicine (ESPRM)
Chair for the International Society of Physical and Rehabilitation Medicine (ISPRM) taskforce INFORM (www.informspecialty.com)
Editor-in-Chief for the SAGE journal Advances in Rehabilitation Science and Practice (https://journals.sagepub.com/home/rpo)
Editor-in-Chief for the Oxford Handbook for Rehabilitation Medicine (https://academic.oup.com/book/29871)
Royal College of Physicians (RCP) CPD lead for the specialty of Rehabilitation Medicine in the UK
Advisor for the World Health Organisation (WHO) Europe – Disability and Rehabilitation during the pandemic
National Advisor for the National Rehabilitation Centre (NRC) since 2023 www.national rehabilitationcentre.nhs.uk

Mrs Rachel Tarrant

Physiotherapist

BSc (Hons) Biosciences & Health, BSc (Hons) Physiotherapy, PG Dip Advancing Respiratory Physiotherapy.

Rachel is a Specialist Respiratory Physiotherapist and the Clinical Lead / Clinical Co-ordinator for the Long COVID Community Rehabilitation service at Leeds Community Healthcare Trust.

Rachel has been working clinically within the field of LC since the summer of 2020, initially working clinically on the respiratory wards at St James’ University Hospital, gathering evidence for the need for LC rehab services in the community and then moving into this clinical leadership role in the Leeds LC community rehab service in Sept 2020. This is on a background of 16 years previous NHS physiotherapy experience. Working alongside system colleagues and partners (across Primary Care, the Leeds Integrated Care Board, Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, Leeds Community Healthcare Trust, Leeds University, Leeds City Council and the third sector VCSE organisations) Rachel has set up the service and continued to lead the multi-disciplinary team (MDT) and work with LC patients for the last 3+ years.

Rachel has special interests in Long Covid rehabilitation, long term condition management, respiratory physiotherapy and rehabilitation. She is passionate about quality improvement and evaluation to drive services forward, improving patient care.

Dr Jayne Woodcock

Clinical Psychologist

Jayne is the Psychology Clinical Lead for the Derbyshire Long COVID Rehabilitation Service, a role she took up in April 2022 and in which she has led on shaping and establishing a psychologically informed inter-disciplinary rehabilitation pathway.

She has brought to this role her particular interests in inter-disciplinary working, providing holistic physical and mental health care, and developing evidence-based and innovative approaches which improve quality of life. Jayne has many years’ experience of working with people with long-term physical health difficulties, including older-adult services, memory assessment, stroke rehabilitation, and ten years working within a specialist service for people with ME/CFS.

She believes that all physical health care should be psychologically-informed; recognising and supporting adjustment to the emotional, psychological and cognitive impact.

Dr Terry Segal

Dr Terry Segal has been a consultant in general paediatrics, paediatric and adolescent endocrinology and adolescent medicine at University College Hospital London ( UCLH) since 2007. She trained in Bristol and London.

She is Clinical Lead for adolescent specialties at UCLH, and Co Leads Transition and developmentally appropriate healthcare for UCLH and Trustee for RCPCH (Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health).

She was convenor of YPHSIG ( Young persons health special interest group) 2018-2021 .Passionate about improving young people's health, she enjoys working with others around the country to raise the voices speaking out with and for adolescents to improve their health.

She is co-lead of the Pan London Post COVID service, set up at speed in relation to demand and the largest in the country, and the service has assessed more than 400 children and young people. She is particularly interested in working with young people with complex problems such as ME/CFS Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, persistent physical symptoms, and those with chronic pain and emotional difficulties, and really enjoys working in a multidisciplinary team, including patients where possible in service developments.

She is asked to lecture widely and has published more than 20 articles in peer- reviewed journals in the areas of Post COVID syndrome, ME/CFS, adolescent written and clinical communication, HEADDSS psychosocial interview, obesity, pubertal delay, CFS and acne. She has co organised several successful adolescent conferences.

Specialities:

Adolescent medicine
Adolescent endocrinology
Post COVID service

Recent Relevant Publications:

Gregorowski, A., Simpson, J., & Segal, T. Y. (2019). Child and adolescent chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis: where are we now?. Current opinion in pediatrics, 31(4), 462–468. https://doi.org/10.1097/MOP.0000000000000777
Seylanova, N., Chernyavskaya, A., Degtyareva, N., Mursalova, A., Ajam, A., Xiao, L., Aktulaeva, K., Roshchin, P., Bobkova, P., Aiyegbusi, O. L., Anbu, A. T., Apfelbacher, C., Asadi-Pooya, A. A., Ashkenazi-Hoffnung, L., Brackel, C., Buonsenso, D., de Groote, W., Diaz, J. V., Dona, D., Dunn Galvin, A., … PC-COS Children Study Group (2024). Core outcome measurement set for research and clinical practice in post-COVID-19 condition (long COVID) in children and young people: an international Delphi consensus study "PC-COS Children". The European respiratory journal, 63(3), 2301761. https://doi.org/10.1183/13993003.01761-2023
Hiremath, S., Doukrou, M., Flannery, H., Carey, C., Gregorowski, A., Ward, J., Hargreaves, D., & Segal, T. Y. (2022). Key Features of a Multi-Disciplinary Hospital-Based Rehabilitation Program for Children and Adolescents with Moderate to Severe Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome ME/CFS. International journal of environmental research and public health, 19(20), 13608. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph192013608
Johnston, R., Sonnappa, S., Goddings, A. L., Whittaker, E., & Segal, T. Y. (2024). A review of post COVID syndrome pathophysiology, clinical presentation and management in children and young people. Paediatric respiratory reviews, S1526-0542(24)00003-4. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.prrv.2024.01.002
Parekh-Hill, N. A., Wood, D., Davis, M., Farooq, A., & Segal, T. Y. (2023). Please write to me, not about me: best practice in written communication with young people. Archives of disease in childhood, 108(4), e5. https://doi.org/10.1136/archdischild-2021-323393
Royston, A. P., Rai, M., Brigden, A., Burge, S., Segal, T. Y., & Crawley, E. M. (2023). Severe myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome in children and young people: a British Paediatric Surveillance Unit study. Archives of disease in childhood, 108(3), 230–235. https://doi.org/10.1136/archdischild-2022-324319
Wacks, M., Wortley, E., Gregorowski, A., Segal, T. Y., & Whittaker, E. (2024). Fifteen-minute consultation: Managing post-COVID-19 syndrome (long COVID) in children and young people. Archives of disease in childhood. Education and practice edition, 109(1), 29–34. https://doi.org/10.1136/archdischild-2022-324950

Ms Joanne Bond-Kendall

Senior Specialist Physiotherapist

Jo has specialised in Children and Young people’s Fatigue for nine years in the Paediatric Specialist Fatigue Service, Bath. This is a national tertiary service seeing Children and Young people who experience fatigue as the result of ME/CFS, cancer related fatigue, fatigue as part of chronic long term health conditions and since 2020, Post COVID-19. She is a member of the clinical leadership team and leads the service in the Post COVID-19 pathway and Research.

Jo takes pride in delivering individualised intervention and support, collaboratively with the Child or young person and their family. She leads on research within the service and links with Bristol University and Bath University with ongoing and future research projects and advocates projects that can have a direct impact on improving the quality of care offered and the development of services. Jo has worked on the new hospitals programme for the RUH, Bath looking into service transformation and the designing of Clinical service models at the RUH whilst also considering whole pathway transformation across the ICS. She was part of instigating the Long COVID Paediatric Hub for the South West, at Bristol Children’s Hospital in August 2021 and a member of its MDT, assessing referrals and delivering recommendations, information, advice and intervention. After the closure of the hub in April 2023, Jo continued by leading the Post COVID-19 pathway within the Paediatric Specialist Fatigue Service Bath, where specialist input for those with Fatigue following COVID has continued.