Major progress made for people with severe asthma
Lottie from our policy team tells us what the severe asthma campaign has achieved over the last year and why we now need your help.
Tens of thousands of people used our interactive tool
So far 30,000 of you have been helped by our online interactive tool which provides tailored support to help you better manage your asthma and lets you know if you should ask for a referral to see a specialist. This is so important because without a referral, people with asthma won’t know if they have severe asthma or are able to access potentially life-changing biologic drugs. It’s brilliant that many of you have been referred to see a specialist and assessed for biologic treatments after using the tool.
“I find your emails so supportive. They have given me the confidence and knowledge which has encouraged me to ask for a referral from my GP, which was done within weeks. I already have an appointment booked for April to be assessed for biologics.”
Working together to increase access to biologics
Asthma UK is playing a key role in a new programme run by Accelerated Access Collaborative (AAC) (our patient rep Jo explains more in this blog and also in this podcast). So far almost £1 million has been awarded to projects to help drive severe asthma referrals and improve services for people with asthma in England. The AAC has also produced this leaflet for people with uncontrolled asthma and introduced a tool in primary care to help identify people who should be referred to a specialist.
In Scotland we have worked with the NHS and industry to improve services for people with severe asthma through the PRECISION project, whilst in Northern Ireland and Wales, we are pushing for severe asthma to be a key part of new lung health strategies.
Life-changing drug approved for use across the UK
After many years of campaigning, a biologic drug called dupilumab was approved for use in Scotland in April 2021 and we were delighted that dupilumab was also approved across the rest of the UK in October this year. You can find out more about dupilumab in this blog.
Help us continue the fight
However, it’s not all been good news. We were extremely disappointed to see that severe asthma was not included within the draft scope for the new asthma clinical guidelines. We have been calling on the National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (NICE) to develop severe asthma guidelines for many years because they are vital in helping people get the referral they need.
Now we need your help. Severe asthma has been neglected for too long and it’s time it was made a priority. Tell us your story of living with asthma so we can make the case for asthma to be taken more seriously, we will be collecting all your stories and using them to make sure politicians and policy makers are prioritising people with asthma and the care they receive.
Where there’s Christmas, there’s hope
Last winter, the cost of running our Helpline was £182,754. This is expected to increase in 2021 as more people turn to us for support. Please donate today and help make sure we can be there for everyone who needs us.