Health protection is one of the responsibilities of Public Health England (PHE). It is a broad and versatile field requiring specialist knowledge and skills provided by a multidisciplinary team. It has been given an increasing profile in recent years following the polonium 210 incident, pandemic flu and more recently SARS-CoV2 and COVID-19 disease.
Health protection is dynamic and responsive to the current health needs of the population. Management of issues such as the Zika and Ebola, hospital acquired infections and tackling antibiotic resistance and of course the COVID-19 pandemic.
Health protection services are on hand to deal with outbreak situations and monitor the emergence of diseases not previously seen in the UK, COVID-19 disease but also Ebola and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) before this. We continue to manage on-going infections with historically well-known diseases such as measles and tuberculosis, and observing the effect that immunisation is having on diseases such as meningitis.
What do health protection teams (HPT) do?
An HPT is a multidisciplinary team consisting of, nurses, practitioners, doctors, surveillance and administrative staff who work closely with colleagues in PHE, environmental health departments, hospital microbiologists and infection and prevention control teams, GPs, community specialists and educational institutions.
The teams are split regionally to provide services locally according to the epidemiological needs. Each team provides local specialist support to prevent and reduce the impact of infectious diseases, hazards, and major emergencies. They are involved in surveillance and monitoring of infectious diseases, strategic health protection work, emergency planning and operational support in addition to education and training, both for health care professionals and the general public. Some of the key areas of expertise include immunisation, gastrointestinal infections, water borne diseases, environmental hazards, travel associated infections, and infection control/hospital acquired infections and respiratory infections including tuberculosis.
Every HPT has an on-call service which provides support to healthcare professionals and members of the public and responds to notifications of infectious disease and any health protection needs.
Notification of infectious disease (NOIDS)
Registered medical practitioners (RMPs) have a statutory duty to notify the Proper Officer via the local HPT of suspected or confirmed cases of certain infectious diseases. There are 32 notifiable diseases and 60 causative agents. The PHE website contains details of where you can find your local health protection team, notification forms and the list of notifiable diseases. The attending RMP should fill out a notification form immediately on diagnosis of a suspected notifiable disease and should not wait for laboratory confirmation before notification. The notification form should be sent to the Proper Officer within three days or notified verbally within 24 hours if the case is considered urgent. Prompt notification will ensure that health protection interventions and control measures can be initiated as soon as possible.
Download this poster from PHE for guidance and information on notifiable diseases and how notifications should be made.
