So much has happened over the last six months. The COVID-19 crisis has taught us much about adapting rapidly and effectively to maintain clinical care for our patients. Even before the crisis many centres around the UK had developed novel and innovative ways of working for the benefit of patients.

All too often, though, whilst such advances may have been implemented locally to good effect, their potentially broad application may not have been realised in the wider endocrine community. It is here that as a member of the Society you have the opportunity to make a real difference.

Steve Ball’s article (page 26) succinctly lays out a whole variety of issues pertaining to clinical care in Specialised Endocrinology in this new era. In relation to this, the Society have formed a working group that is examining the ‘Future of Endocrinology’. It aims to share best practice and to truly take a step back and question how services may be best configured. We are working to tight time frames to ‘capture the moment’ and see what can be done differently.

One part of this activity is to gather innovative service ideas as a central resource that may then be shared across the UK for the betterment of patient care. It is possible that you have developed something that is either simple or obvious to you, and assume that everyone else must be doing the same, but this is not always the case.

So, what can you do? Simply think of the three clinical service innovations of which you are either the proudest, or that has had the biggest impact for patients with endocrine disease at your centre or region.

Send your thoughts to [email protected] for consideration by the working group.

JOHN NEWELL-PRICE, KRISTIEN BOELAERT and ANTONIA BROOKE
On behalf of the Society’s Future of Endocrinology working group