Dr Caroline Baugh, OW and GP, helps establish new Covid-19 Assessment Centre

We want to say a huge thank you to Dr Caroline Baugh OW (Ap 92) and current parent who is currently working on the front line during the Covid-19 pandemic, please see Caroline’s full story below:

I’m currently a GP Partner in Basingstoke, and prior to this have worked across Africa with Médecins sans Frontieres and GOAL. Whilst in Sudan I worked on Cholera and Measles epidemics which gave me some experience in managing outbreaks and epidemics. I became the COVID19 lead for our Primary Care Network at the outset of this pandemic, and we quickly set up a Red Site for managing our likely COVID patients.

Over the last two weeks we have now partnered with eleven local practices and have set up a COVID Assessment Centre for the Basingstoke and North Hampshire region, covering over 200,000 patients. On Monday we opened a drive through element to this service. This allows us to assess patients who are becoming unwell with COVID, particularly for their oxygen demands, and see if we can continue to manage them at home with support, or whether they need admission to hospital.

So far, this has been incredibly positive. Patients have really welcomed the service and the leadership and collaboration with other local practices and also with our hospital colleagues has been inspiring and a really positive force.

I am very keen that we draw on these positives moving forward. Whilst COVID has been devastating in so many ways, the sense of team spirit and collaboration both in the medical community, and in the wider public is something we need to try and hold on to, so that in the long term, this horrible disease can be a force for a positive change.