Specialist Paediatric Respiratory Medicine

We are one of four London centres for childhood cystic fibrosis, and are the specialist referral centre for children and young people in Northeast London and Essex with respiratory problems. 

Conditions we investigate or treat include:

  • Wheezing disorders including difficult to treat asthma
  • Persistent cough 
  • Primary ciliary dyskinesia and other bronchiectasis
  • Recurrent lung infection
  • Lung disease from other conditions (e.g. sickle cell, cerebral palsy)
  • Immunodeficiency
  • Congenital lung abnormality
  • Airway problems
  • Obstructive sleep apnoea and other sleep-disordered breathing problems (including sleep studies)
  • Severe obesity
  • Non-invasive ventilation and tracheostomy
  • Aspiration lung disease

Services we offer include:

  • Sleep study
  • Home oximetry
  • Bronchoscopy
  • Induced sputum
  • Spirometry
  • Exercise testing
  • Fitness to fly testing
  • Allergy testing (for respiratory allergens only)
  • Oesophageal pH-Impedance study
  • Obesity investigation
  • Swallow assessment
  • Exhaled nitric oxide testing
  • Nasal nitric oxide testing (for PCD)
  • Sweat testing (for CF)
  • Inhaler technique training
  • Asthma education
  • Respiratory physiotherapy

Information for professionals

Most respiratory conditions can be managed in the community and we aim to provide initial management advice via links on this website.  Where referral is required (note we see children with all the above problems) specific criteria apply to some services:

  • Most CF patients are picked up via the newborn screening pathway, other strongly suspected CF patients will be seen urgently in the general respiratory clinic following telephone discussion (bleep 1042 via switchboard). 
  • The Metabolic obesity clinic can only accept children with BMI >3.5 z-score above the mean, this can be assessed by this UK-WHO growth chart app.
  • External sweat test requests must come from secondary care using this request form.
  • Sleep study requests must come from secondary care using this request form.
  • The asthma clinic accepts children uncontrolled at BTS step 3 or who have evidence of poor control with salbutamol overuse, x1 hospital admission, or x2 ED attendance or oral steroid course in two years.
  • The difficult asthma service accepts referrals from secondary care; suitable patients will have been admitted to ICU or required IV bronchodilator recently, or are uncontrolled at BTS step 3-4.  In either case the referral form attached should be completed.

Our research 

Professor Grigg is based at the Blizard Institute of Queen Mary University of London, conducting basic and clinical research on children’s lung health.  He supervises research fellows and specialises in preschool wheeze and pollution research. Many of our junior medical staff and even consultants have done research degrees at the Blizard Institute and Professor Grigg encourages approaches from interested candidates.

Through our involvement with the organisations such as the MCRN, the CLAHRC, the The CF Trust and AUKCAR we offer our families opportunities to benefit from involvement in clinical research such as the WAIT, TORPEDO-CF, CHILD-EU, and UK-ESPE studies.

Meet the team

Consultants:

  • Caroline Pao – Head of Department, Cystic Fibrosis Centre Director
  • Sarah Brown – Clinical Lead for Sleep Medicine and Non-invasive Ventilation
  • Chinedu Nwokoro – Clinical Lead for Asthma and Chronic Lung Disease
  • Jonathan Grigg – Professor of Paediatric Respiratory Medicine, Academic Lead and Joint Asthma Lead

Clinical Nurse Specialists:

Junior Doctors (SpR – bleep 1042, SHO – bleep 1053): 

  • Darzi Leadership Fellow in Asthma – Dr Sarah Walker
  • Cystic Fibrosis Clinical Fellow – Dr Shrabani Chakraborty
  • Research Fellow – Dr Norrice Liu, Lee Koh

Physiotherapists: 

  • Rachel O’Connor
  • Jasmine Miller (CF)
  • Rhiannon Clark (Respiratory)
  • Penny Wilcox (Community Lead)

Dietitians: 

  • Mike McLean
  • Gurpreet Virdee
  • Charlotte Walker

Physiologists: 

  • Rasheda Choudhury (lead)
  • John Rae
  • Paul Eze-John
  • Victoria Oyenuga

Psychologists: 

  • Dr Kate Blakeley
  • Charmaine Keane

Pharmacist: 

  • Nanna Christiansen

Administrators: 

  • Faiza Khan (Sleep medicine) - phone 020 3594 6441
  • Richard Lah (CF Registry)
  • Naa Arne and Christine Kotb (secretaries) – 020 3594 2474

Ward Manager: 

  • Vivienne Casley