ERS Assembly 9: Allied respiratory professionals

Group 09.01
Chair: Karl Sylvester
Secretary: Rachel Ong-Salvador

This Group exists to represent all scientific and educational activities in the ERS with relation to all aspects of clinical respiratory physiology. Respiratory function diagnostics and therapeutic monitoring are now key areas in healthcare delivery across Europe and our Group is interested in the scientific, technical and quality issues of these services.

We would like to open up our Group to all members who practice respiratory physiology, whether in primary care, secondary care or in a research environment. Education, research, and quality are the key issues in protecting patients from misdiagnosis and poor measurement. We intend to lead in research, training and quality in clinical respiratory physiology throughout Europe and in collaboration with the ERS school, and we are supportive of all respiratory technology and services requiring physiological measurement.

Group 09.02
Chair: Deniz Inal-Ince
Secretary: Andre Nyberg

This Group was set up to provide a scientific basis for respiratory physiotherapists within the ERS. Physiotherapists specialised in the care of patients with respiratory disorders are scattered throughout Europe and worldwide in many national organisations.

Pressing issues like standardisation of therapeutic techniques, homogenised training standards, quality assurance and physiotherapy-related clinical research argue towards joining forces across national borders. Furthermore, there is the need to interact more intensively with medical doctors and other healthcare professionals concerned with respiratory care. Our Group provides the platform for such endeavours and thus has the potential to foster the distribution of specialised respiratory physiotherapy throughout Europe and worldwide.

Group 09.03
Chair: José Miguel dos Santos Castro Padilha
Secretary: Rui Pedro Marques da Silva

The nursing Group has the objective to stimulate advancement in respiratory nursing by promoting nursing research and by facilitating dissemination of scientific results in terms of congress presentations and publication of evidence based recommendations.

In addition, this Group aims to develop the knowledge, clinical and scientific skills of nurses working in different settings such as hospitals, primary care and academic institutions through communication on relevant congresses and courses, and by facilitating sharing of knowledge and information between nurses and other professional working in respiratory care. This Group also offers the opportunity to nurses expand their network with international nursing associations and collaborate with nurses and other respiratory disciplines all over Europe.

Group 09.04
Chair: Daniel Langer
Secretary: Jellien Makonga-Braaksma

The ERS Group 09.04 ‘Psychologists and Behavioural Scientists’ was launched in 2020 to support psychological and behavioural aspects of respiratory care, in order to improve multidisciplinary clinical practice, education, and research.

Our multidisciplinary group welcomes individuals from a variety of professional backgrounds who are interested or actively involved in this field (e.g., psychologists, nurses, physicians, therapists, and social workers).

The main topics in our group are the prevention, detection and treatment of psychological symptoms and distress as well as cognitive dysfunction in people with respiratory diseases, but also in their caregivers. This includes individually tailored behaviour change techniques, self-management and psychosocial interventions, which are ideally embedded in multidisciplinary contexts.

In collaboration with other ERS groups, our group facilitates the collection and exchange of scientific and clinical knowledge in this field with congress presentations, task forces, workshops and publications of evidence based recommendations.