Respiratory Medicine and Lung Cancer - Royal Oldham, Fairfield Hospital [Bury], Rochdale Infirmary

The Respiratory Directorate provides specialist services from our hospital sites and community settings for the people in the North-East sector of Greater Manchester. It is a well-developed service with an excellent reputation led by a dynamic team. Inpatient Respiratory Services are provided on the Acute Respiratory Care Unit at Fairfield Hospital incorporating Respiratory enhanced care providing acute Non-invasive ventilation (NIV) and Continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP).

Interstitial lung disease, bronchiectasis, nurse led oxygen assessment and general respiratory clinics are held at Fairfield and Rochdale Infirmary. Community chronic obstructive pulmonary disease​​​​​​​ (COPD) and physiotherapy teams in Bury and Heywood Middle and Rochdale (HMR) assess patients and undertake pulmonary rehabilitation.

Pleural and Sleep clinics are held at Fairfield Hospital, Bury.

  • Inpatient services
  • Lung Cancer Clinics / MDT
  • Sleep Clinics
  • General Respiratory
  • Post-COVID Syndrome Clinics / MDT
  • ILD clinics
  • Bronchiectasis  clinics
  • Pulmonary rehabilitation
  • Nurse led respiratory clinics
  • Full pulmonary function and sleep studies
  • TB clinic (provided by ID at NMGH)

You should bring a copy of current medication to any appointment and follow information sent to you in the appointment letter.

The main hospital base for the Respiratory service is Fairfield General Hospital, with services offered across Greater Manchester.

The new £10m Community Diagnostic Centre (CDC) in Oldham opened to patients in December 2022.  A number of testing services are available at the Oldham CDC including MRI, PET-CT, CT X-ray, ultrasound, heart and lung function tests and sleep studies. 

The CDC will offer additional capacity to testing that is delivered at Fairfield, particularly for patients located in or near to Oldham. Our aim is to cut waiting times for tests and provide and earlier diagnosis of lung cancer and sleep disorders with easier access to testing within a community setting. 

Our sector provides one of the largest lung cancer services in the country with over 650 patients diagnosed a year and around 1,700 annual GP referrals to our Two Week Wait lung cancer clinics. The organisation aims to deliver the Optimal Greater Manchester Lung Cancer Pathway and diagnostic algorithms.

An enhanced triage and virtual clinic system is employed to manage referrals with the support of Lung Cancer Navigators and Pathway Support Nurses. We aim to offer CT and first appointment for the highest risk category patients within 3 days of referral and within 7 days for lower risk patients. The service provides new and follow-up lung cancer and Clinical Oncology clinics at Fairfield together with bronchoscopy and Endobronchial ultrasound (EBUS) lists at Fairfield. Through the single queue diagnostic system within Greater Manchester, we have access to EBUS slots across Greater Manchester to ensure timely access to diagnostic tests.

There is good access to CT-guided biopsy (This is performed at Royal Oldham Hospital and Salford Hospital), interventional Radiology and thoracoscopy (medical thoracoscopy lists are held Salford Royal Hospitals). Through the single queue diagnostic system within Greater Manchester we have access to CT-guided biopsy and thoracoscopy slots across Greater Manchester to ensure timely access to diagnostic tests.

Positron emission tomography (PET) scanning is delivered at The Community Diagnostic Hub in Royton, Oldham, Manchester Royal Infirmary, the Christie hospital in Manchester and Wigan Infirmary.  Medical Oncology clinics are held within the sector and at the Christie Hospital in South Manchester.

Lung cancer nurse specialists support the lung cancer service through nurse-led follow up of radically treated patients and a pulmonary nodule follow up service.

Assistant Practitioners perform electronic Health Needs Assessments of lung cancer patients, shuttle walk tests and prehabilitation clinics on the Fairfield and Oldham sites.

Each acute site has a weekly diagnostic lung multidisciplinary team (MDT). A well-established weekly Trust-wide lung MDT meeting is attended by Thoracic Surgery, Medical and Clinical Oncology, Radiology and Histopathology consultants. Thoracic surgery and airways management are delivered at Wythenshawe Hospital in South Manchester. Our ‘Christie Hospital at Oldham’ has allowed patients to receive cancer care including radiotherapy nearer to home.

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