FRESH AIR international research programme
Collaborating internationally to address the problem of lung disease
The University of Plymouth is leading on several projects within the FRESH AIR programme including the pulmonary rehabilitation projects in remote settings, starting in mountain villages in Crete with aims to progress to remote high altitude nomadic communities in Kyrgyz Republic and rural communities in Vietnam.
There is also a project evaluating an education programme for midwives in rural Uganda to deliver improving pregnancy outcomes and child health in the first six months of life. The project teaches people about the dangers of biomass smoke from cooking fires, from kerosene lamps and other sources, including tobacco smoking.
Dr Rupert Jones is leading a team of Plymouth researchers within an international collaboration in a range of studies addressing the problem of chronic lung disease in resource-poor settings.
Who is involved?
The University of Plymouth, UK
- Rupert Jones (PUPSMD)
- Sanne van Kampen (PUPSMD)
- Jill Pooler (PUPSMD)
- Lucy Cartwright (PUPSMD)
- Andy Barton (Research Design Service)
- Lynne Callaghan (PUPSMD)
- Michael Hyland (School of Psychology)
Makerere University, Uganda
- Dr Bruce Kirenga and team
University of Groningen, Holland
- Dr Frederik van Gemert
- Prof Niels Chavannes
The Breathe Again Africa Project
A crowd-funded project to build a pulmonary rehabilitation centre in Kampala to treat people with chronic lung disease without using drugs.
With chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) now the third leading cause of death in the world, and a rising prevalence in Africa, now is the time to put the research into pulmonary rehabilitation into practice.
Find out more about the Project and how you can support a life-giving programme today.
Posters
Conferences
Publications
Pledge your support
Posters
These posters were presented at the European Respiratory Society Annual International Conference in London, 2016.
- Dr Jill Pooler presented ‘Adapting and implementing very brief advice on smoking to save lives in low and middle income countries’ at the IPCRG World Conference, Porto, Portugal, 31 May – 2 June 2018
- Dr Rupert Jones presented ‘The 5 steps leaflet: A patient guide to managing their COPD developed in the FRESH AIR programme’ at the IPCRG World Conference, Porto, Portugal, 31 May – 2 June 2018
- Dr Rupert Jones presented ‘Implementing of pulmonary rehabilitation in Vietnam, preliminary results’ at the IPCRG World Conference, Porto, Portugal, 31 May – 2 June 2018
- Dr Sanne van Kampen presented ‘International research and guidelines on post-tuberculosis chronic lung disease: a systematic scoping review’ at the IPCRG World Conference, Porto, Portugal, 31 May – 2 June 2018
- Lucy Cartwright presented ‘An implementation strategy for a midwife-led education programme of biomass smoke reduction among pregnant women and postnatal mothers in Uganda’ at the IPCRG World Conference, Porto, Portugal, 31 May – 2 June 2018
- Dr Jill Pooler presented ‘Very brief advice on smoking saves lives, but does it work in low and middle-income countries?’ at the PATS and SATS Congress, Durban, South Africa, 12-15 April 2018
- Dr Rupert Jones presented ‘Database studies in Uganda - an opportunity for global research where chronic lung disease matters’ at the 2018 REG Summit, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 22-24 March 2018
- Dr Rupert Jones presented ‘Quantitative evaluation of the implementation of a pulmonary rehabilitation programme in rural Crete’ at the SAPC Conference, Plymouth, UK, 13-14 March 2018
- Dr Rupert Jones presented ‘The development and implementation of a lung health programme for community health workers in the rural district Masindi of Uganda’ at the IPCRG South Asian Scientific Conference, Colombo, Sri Lanka, 3-5 August 2017
- Dr Jill Pooler presented ’30 minutes to save a life – Very Brief Advice on Smoking’ at the IPCRG South Asian Scientific Conference, Colombo, Sri Lanka, 3-5 August 2017
- Dr Rupert Jones presented a poster ‘A development study of pulmonary rehabilitation for patients with chronic lung disease in Uganda’ at the 47th Union World Conference on Lung Health, Liverpool, UK, 26–29 Oct 2016
- Dr Rupert Jones presented ‘The development of a lung health awareness-raising programme in Masindi province, Uganda’ at the 47th Union World Conference on Lung Health, Liverpool, UK, 26–29 Oct 2016
- Dr Rupert Jones presented a poster ‘A development study of pulmonary rehabilitation for patients with chronic lung disease in Uganda’ at the ERS International Congress, London, UK, 3-7 September 2016
- Dr Jill Pooler presented a poster ‘A qualitative study on the development of a pulmonary rehabilitation programme for patients with chronic lung disease in Kampala, Uganda’ at the ERS International Congress, London, UK, 3-7 September 2016
- Dr Rupert Jones presented an invited lecture ‘Silent killer on the rise – addressing the causes and treatment of lung disease in Africa’ at the Derriford Hospital Research Day, 17 June 2016
- Dr Rupert Jones presented ‘Rapid Assessment of the Demand and Supply of Tobacco Dependence Pharmacotherapy in Uganda’ at the IPCRG 8th World Conference, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 25–28 May 2016
- Dr Rupert Jones presented an invited lecture ‘Implementing Pulmonary Rehabilitation in Low Resource Settings’ at the IPCRG 8th World Conference, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 25–28 May 2016
- Dr Rupert Jones presented ‘Lessons from designing and implementing pulmonary rehabilitation in Kampala’ at the IPCRG 8th World Conference, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 25–28 May 2016
- Dr Rupert Jones designed and presented a poster ‘Training Community Health Workers in Rural Uganda to Introduce Stop Smoking Interventions in a Context of a Lung Health Awareness Campaign’ at the Global Tobacco Dependence Treatment Summit, Minnesota, USA, 23-24 May 2016
- Dr Jill Pooler presented ‘Qualitative findings on the implementation of pulmonary rehabilitation in Kampala’ at the PATS Congress, Nairobi, Kenya, 9–12 April 2016
- Dr Rupert Jones presented ‘The development and implementation of a Lung Health programme for rural Uganda addressing biomass and tobacco smoke’ at the PATS Congress, Nairobi, Kenya, 9–12 April 2016
- Dr Rupert Jones provided a teaching seminar ‘COPD in Africa’ to the Junior Doctors’ respiratory training at Derriford Hospital, Plymouth, 16 January 2016
- Dr Rupert Jones presented an invited lecture ‘Research in COPD in UK and Africa’ at the British Lung Foundation South West Regional Meeting, 15 September 2015
- Dr Rupert Jones presented ‘An exploratory trial to test the impact of training midwives to deliver biomass smoke reduction on exposures, pregnancy outcome and infant health’ at the IPCRG 4th Scientific Meeting, Singapore, 28-30 May 2015
- Dr Rupert Jones took a teaching seminar ‘Chronic respiratory disease in Africa: a neglected problem’ at the University of Plymouth as part of the Community and Primary Care Research Group seminar series, 15 April 2015
- Dr Rupert Jones lead a workshop ‘Why do we need quality indicators in pulmonary rehabilitation?’ at Lungerehabiliteringskonferansen, Oslo, Norway, 15 January 2015
- Dr Rupert Jones presented an invited lecture ‘Rehabilitation in primary care – criteria for success and failure’ at Lungerehabiliteringskonferansen, Oslo, Norway, 15 January 2015
- Dr Rupert Jones presented ‘A pilot study of pulmonary rehabilitation in post tuberculosis patients in Uganda' at the IPCRG 7th World Conference, Athens, Greece, 21-24 May 2014
- Dr Rupert Jones presented ‘Prevalence of COPD in a rural area of a sub-Saharan country: FRESH AIR Uganda’ at the IPCRG 3rd Scientific Meeting, Uppsala, Sweden, 23-24 May 2013
Publications
Siddharthan T, Grigsby MR, Goodman D, et al. Association between Household Air Pollution Exposure and Chronis Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Outcomes in 13 Low- and Middle-Income Country Settings. American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. 2018;197(5):611-620
https://www.atsjournals.org/doi/10.1164/rccm.201709-1861OC
Jones R. The scale of the
problem of obstructive lung disease in Africa becomes clearer, but where are
the solutions? European Respiratory
Journal. 2018;51(2):ARTN
1702562.
http://erj.ersjournals.com/content/51/2/1702562
Jones R, Kirenga B, Katagira
W, et al. A pre-post intervention study of pulmonary rehabilitation for adults
with post-tuberculosis lung disease in Uganda. International Journal of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease. 2017;12:3533-3539.
https://www.dovepress.com/a-pre-post-intervention-study-of-pulmonary-rehabilitation-for-adults-w-peer-reviewed-article-COPD
Kirenga B, Jones R, Muhofa
A, Nyakoojo G, Williams S. Rapid assessment of the demand and supply of tobacco
dependence pharmacotherapy in Uganda. Public
Health Action. 2016;6(1):35-37.
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/iuatld/pha/2016/00000006/00000001/art00010;jsessionid=3dfkmossfavp4.x-ic-live-01
van Gemert F, Chavannes N,
Kirenga B, et al. Socioeconomic factors, gender and smoking as determinants of
COPD in a low-income country of sub-Saharan Africa: FRESH AIR Uganda. Primary Care Respiratory Medicine. 2016;26(1):ARTN 16050.
https://www.nature.com/articles/npjpcrm201650
van Gemert F, Kirenga B,
Chavannes N, et al. Prevalence of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and
associated risk factors in Uganda (FRESH AIR Uganda): a prospective
cross-sectional observational study. The
Lancet Global Health. 2015;3(1):e44-e51.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214109X14703377?via%3Dihub
van Gemert F, van der Molen
T, Jones R, Chavannes N. The impact of asthma and COPD in sub-Saharan Africa. Primary Care Respiratory Journal. 2011;20(3):240-248.
https://www.nature.com/articles/pcrj201127
Project films
“I was feeling weak all the time. I couldn’t sleep, I could do nothing at home…I didn’t know what to do. As I went through the programme, I realised that it was a real medicine to my health…I feel strong, stronger than before…I can now stay longer at the place of work. I am so happy and I appreciate the directors of this programme.” – patient's account
Find out more about the great work taking place and discover why we still need your help by watching our videos.
