Bloomsbury Clinic

There is a new strain of mpox, please see here for updates.

If you have developed a rash/sore or ulcer and you or someone you have been in contact with has travelled to the countries below within the last 21 days, do not attend our service.  Please contact 111.

DRC, Republic of the Congo, Central African Republic, Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda, Kenya, Cameroon, Gabon, Angola, South Sudan, Tanzania, Zambia.

Welcome to the Bloomsbury Clinic

The Bloomsbury Clinic provides outpatient care for people with HIV at the Mortimer Market Centre in London.

• Anybody living with HIV in the UK can access our service, regardless of where they live and you can transfer your care without a referral, just phone or email us (see contact details on this page)
• We have a fantastic team that includes specialist doctors, nurses, psychologists, pharmacists, health advisers and peer support workers
• We have a pharmacy on site and offer blood tests, sexual health check-ups, contraception, menopause advice and clinical trials under one roof. We work closely with University College Hospital next door to provide inpatient care, specialist tests, antenatal care and referrals to other teams
• We also run clinics for people with hepatitis B and C as part of the North Central London hepatitis network.  Read more about our hepatitis services.
• We have a booklet that includes information about our services and how they can help you. It also points to other sources of information and support that you might find useful.

Please note, this service is for people living with HIV or viral hepatitis – if you need tests then please visit our STIs and contraception page.

Hepatitis services

Please visit our HIV and hepatitis services page to find out more.

I am a health care professional seeking advice or wanting to refer

Please visit our contact page.

Important COVID information

Please visit the NHS website for more information.

You may be eligible for Covid treatments if your CD4 count is less than 200 and or you have a detectable viral load. That is a viral load greater than 50 copies/ml.

Important information about attending our service

• NHS COVID guidelines may differ from other settings (e.g. shops, restaurants) as we need to protect staff and service users, especially those who are vulnerable.
• You will be asked to wear a mask and sanitise your hands when you enter the building and you may be asked some questions about symptoms.
• Please be patient with us – we are trying to keep everyone as safe as we can.

Appointments

We offer booked appointments, face to face and by phone. If you prefer to see the same clinician we will try our best to accommodate this but on occasion you may be asked to see a different member of staff

• It is essential we have your correct contact details - if you may have updated your number since your last clinic visit please call 020 3317 5100 or email us at b.patients@nhs.net
• If you are due an appointment, or you wish to change your appointment time, please call 020 3317 5100 or email us at b.patients@nhs.net If you receive medications via Boots or home delivery please ensure you have at least a month of medications left at the time of your appointment.
• At the time of your phone appointment please ensure your phone is switched on, in an area of good reception where you have privacy to speak.  We will aim to call you at the exact time but we may call up to 20 minutes either side.  If we are unable to get through, we will send you a text asking you to re-book.  It may not be possible to re-book with the same clinician depending on capacity.
• Currently most phone appointments are 20 minutes long, and face to face appointments are 20 minutes for most senior doctors and 30 minutes for trainee doctors and specialist nurses.

If you are more than 10 minutes late for an appointment we will endeavour to see you but may ask you to rebook. We will ensure you have sufficient medication.

• For urgent clinical issues that cannot be addressed by your GP or NHS 111 please call 07464 835 124 where you can leave a message for a doctor who will get back to you within one working day – please do not use this number to book or change appointments.

I want to transfer my care to or from the Bloomsbury Clinic

To transfer to our service:

• Please call us on 020 3317 5100 or email us at b.patients@nhs.net
• We will need your full name, date of birth, contact information and, ideally, GP details as well as other details including you ethnic group and sexuality
• Our Health adviser team will contact you, ask permission to write to your previous clinic for information and arrange an appointment with a doctor or specialist nurse at a time that suits you. You can ask your previous clinic to send your information to us in advance to hiv-referralsandadvice.cnwl@nhs.net
• Please make sure you have an up to date list of any medications (including anything you buy over the counter, herbal remedies and vitamin/mineral supplements) when you have you doctor/nurse appointment.
• Please try to have at least 1 month of your medications left when you contact us – we can arrange an emergency supply if needed
• If you need an urgent medical assessment we can see you in the Bloomsbury Emergency Clinic

If you want to transfer your care from our service:

• Please call 020 3317 5100 or email b.patients@nhs.net and one of the secretarial team will take the details of your new clinic and ask one of the team to write a transfer summary – let them know if you would like a copy.

Blood tests

Our blood service is back to normal but we may need to reduce access intermittently depending on COVID restrictions but will always have capacity to do essential tests.

If you do need tests you should receive a text reminder to book your bloods at least 1 week in advance of your appointment – the message will in include a link to book online. If you are unable to do that, please call or email us on b.patients@nhs.net

Medications

Prior to your appointment please check how much medication you have left.  Please discuss how you receive your medications with your clinician during your appointment  - please note clinic and pharmacy opening hours to the right.

Please make sure you have at least a 30-day supply of medication and contact us if you have less than this.

Home delivery / Boots – if you are already signed up please ensure you have least four weeks of medications at the time of your appointment.

If you usually collect medications from Mortimer Market, please decide a pick-up date with your clinician during your phone appointment to reduce waiting time. Please pick up medications on the arranged date as pharmacy have limited storage room.

If you are running low on medications please call 020 3317 5100. We may be able to book you a phone appointment for the same day, otherwise we will organise an emergency to cover you until a phone appointment is available.

If someone needs to collect your medication from clinic for you they will need you name and date of birth.

Important information about switching from branded to generic (unbranded) HIV medication

When the license on a branded HIV drug expires, we often switch to the generic or unbranded medication which is usually significantly less expensive. We will do our best to inform you before your medication changes. Most drugs prescribed on the NHS are generic and are contain medication identical to the branded versions.

In 2022 we will be undertaking the following switches but will talk to you about these first:

• Evotaz (atazanavir + cobicistat in a single pill) to separate atazanavir plus either cobicistat or ritonavir (2 pills total). Evotaz is no longer being produced by its manufacturer
• Rezolsta (darunavir + cobicistat in a single pill) to separate darunavir plus either cobicistat or ritonavir (2 pills total). Rezolsta will still be available for people who really need it but it will be a lot more expensive than the separate pills
• Symtuza (tenofovir-AF, emtrictabine, darunavir + cobicistat in a single pill) to two or three pills. If you must be on a single pill Symtuza will still be available

If you have any questions about your treatment or contraception, speak to your doctor, specialist nurse or pharmacist.

Injectable treatments

From April 2022 the NHS will start providing injectable HIV treatments.

There are some important things to note:

• The treatment will not be suitable for everybody – if you have any known or suspected resistance to the one of the two drugs, or you do not have an undetectable viral load, the treatment is not right for you
• You will need to come to the clinic every 2 months for an injection into the muscle of each buttock – it is very important to attend on time (the injection can be given up to a maximum of 7 days before or after it is due) or there is a risk your viral load will go up and resistance to the drugs could develop
• You will spend 30-60 minutes in clinic each time you have an injection
• In clinical trials, about 1 in 70 people receiving the injectable treatment every 2 months developed a detectable viral load even though they had the injections on time, and most of those also developed resistance to one or both drugs
• If you are interested in injectable treatment please speak to one of the team

STI screening and contraception

• If you have no symptoms you can have a check for sexually transmitted infections when you attend for routine blood tests
• If you have symptoms, have been a contact of someone with an STI or you want a check-up but are not due bloods then please visit our STIs and contraception page.
• We offer a wide range of contraception options.

HIV Peer Support in Bloomsbury

The Bloomsbury Clinic at the Mortimer Market Centre has been a front runner in providing open access Peer Support to our patients for over twenty years.

HIV Peer support workers are professionals living with HIV, who are happy to share their own journey of living with HIV to aid in the recovery of others. They provide a ‘lived experience’ approach to managing HIV on a day to day basis, focussing on the emotional and practical issues that may come up after diagnosis, and different from a medical perspective of managing HIV.

Our Peer support team provide a ‘person centred and solution focused approach’ to the issues that living with HIV presents. We offer help and advice, brief solution focussed informal counselling, and signposting to external agencies.

We are not experts in housing, immigration or benefits advice but we can signpost to those who are.

Beyond Diagnosis’ courses (BDCs)

Alongside our colleagues from the Bloomsbury Network we also co-run four ‘Beyond Diagnosis’ courses (BDCs) annually.

• ‘Beyond diagnosis’ courses run over three consecutive Saturdays and explore many of the aspects of living well with HIV including HIV Transmission, HIV and Sex, Managing Stigma, Medication and Prevention.
• The course is designed and delivered by people living with HIV for those who have had a new diagnosis and those who have been living with HIV for some time but feel that they need more information.
• You do not need to be a Bloomsbury patient to attend BDCs, the only attendance criteria is that you are living with HIV and want to learn more about it.
• If you would like to speak to one of the Peer support team about attending a BDC or any other issues please contact us on 020 3317 5177 or email cnwl.MMC-HIV-PeerSupport@nhs.net (please leave a clear message with your details if your call goes to our answerphone and we will get back to you asap).  

We are linked to the Bloomsbury Network, an independent charity run by and for people living with HIV. The Bloomsbury Network (BN) co-run BDCs (see above) and also organise various social events and forums/clinical updates throughout the year. You can read more and sign up for updates and newsletters on the Bloomsbury website.

Other organisations

There are several organisations providing peer support in London, including Positively UK and the Terrence Higgins Trust – please speak to our peer support workers or Health Advisers for information about these and other organisations

Emotional and wellbeing support

If you need emotional or wellbeing support from us please visit this page.  

Domestic abuse

Scared of your ex or partner? 

Domestic abuse can affect anyone. 

You are not alone.

If you have concerns, please talk to us in the first instance or call National Domestic Abuse Helpline: 0808 2000 247.

Information about how we share your records

Bloomsbury, Earnsdale and Buryfields HIV Clinics, as part of Central and North West London (CNWL), partner with University College London Hospitals (UCLH) for many services including blood tests, prescriptions and, for London, X-rays/scans, inpatient admissions and specialist referrals. 

Please note that medication prescribed by CNWL may be visible to other UCLH departments who are seeing you for medical care at UCLH (for example if you attend UCLH Accident and Emergency, UCLH outpatients or are admitted as an inpatient). This is an important safety check to prevent you being given medication that may interact with your HIV drugs. Your information will only be seen by those who need to see it and they will only be given access to the information required to provide the best possible care. 

Your Bloomsbury/Buryfields/Earnsdale clinic record will not be visible or accessible outside of CNWL.

You can find out more about how your personal information is used by CNWL here:

• CNWL Your Information Leaflet
• CNWL General Data Protection Regulation – Privacy Notice 

Patient feedback on the Bloomsbury Service 2022

We invited all of the Bloomsbury clients to give their feedback on the service that they receive.

Visit our web page to find out the results and what we have done with the feedback.

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