Professor Sanjay Agrawal
Professor Agrawal is a consultant in respiratory and intensive care medicine at the University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust (UHL), national clinical advisor on tobacco dependency to NHS England & Improvement and chairs the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) tobacco advisory group. With others he helped develop the British Thoracic Society (BTS) National Tobacco audit in Secondary Care and the BTS Tobacco Quality Improvement tool as was co-editor of the RCP report published in 2018 Hiding in plain sight: treating tobacco dependency in the NHS. Synopsis COVID-19 is the world’s most serious pandemic since 1918 whilst tobacco use is the world’s largest non-communicable disease. The combination of COVID-19 lung injury with pre-existing tobacco related lung disease would intuitively seem to be a bad combination. In this review we will examine emerging evidence whether smokers are more vulnerable or protected from COVID-19 and if nicotine therapy may help.
Dr Alison Prittard
Dr Alison Pittard was appointed as a consultant in Leeds in 1997 and since then has been heavily involved in education and training, first as board (faculty) tutor and then regional advisor. She became a diploma examiner in 2006 and continues to examine for the Fellowship. The Faculty of Intensive Care Medicine was established in 2010 and, as lead RA, Dr Pittard was co-opted onto Faculty Board. She developed evidence-based selection tools for recruitment to the ICM CCT programme and created the written exam for the FFICM, both in 2012. At the same time, she was appointed as associate dean, HEE Yorkshire and The Humber. She was one of the first elected members to FICM Board and was elected vice dean in 2016. Alison became Dean in 2019, continuing to lead the development of enhanced care. This resulted in a joint publication with the three Royal Colleges of Physicians in May 2020 and she continues to support the national development of specialty specific enhanced care services. COVID-19 placed ICM under the spotlight and made her role as dean much more prominent. This unexpected recognition resulted in investment in critical care capacity and an extra 114 training posts. Outside medicine Alison is a proud mother of two girls, studying computer science and veterinary medicine. She enjoys singing, playing piano, running, cooking and spending time with her family. She likes to ski in the winter and relax by a pool in the summer but this year she taught herself to play alto saxophone instead.
Professor Onn Min Kon
Professor Onn Min Kon is a Respiratory Physician and Head of Service for Tuberculosis at Imperial College London Healthcare NHS Trust. He is also Professor of Respiratory Medicine at Imperial College London. He is the Chair of the UK National MDRTB Clinical Advice Service and of the British Thoracic Society Joint Tuberculosis Committee. He has published over 100 peer reviewed papers including publications in Nature Medicine, the New England Journal of Medicine and the Lancet. He has also authored several book chapters, editorials and reviews. His research interests include the clinical and immune diagnosis of tuberculosis and the delivery of care and management of the disease. He also participates in research evaluating the effects of infection on airways disease. Professor Kon organises the annual London Advanced TB course.
Session 5: Respiratory
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Professor Sanjay Agrawal
Consultant in respiratory and intensive care medicine, University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust
Dr Alison Prittard
Dean, The Faculty of Intensive Care Medicine
Professor Onn Min Kon
Respiratory physician, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust
