Carla Astles
Carla qualified as Registered Nurse (Adult) in 1997. A planned move into Primary care 10 months later meant committing to professional development across all ages. In the early 2000’s, when working as a prison nurse, Carla took an opportunity to focus on respiratory. Carrying this back into Primary Care in 2003, her generalist role became more streamlined, respiratory at the forefront.
In the last decade, Carla has worked for the Southampton Integrated COPD Team as a Nurse educator for Primary Care and as a Respiratory Nurse Researcher with Wessex CLAHRC. Since returning to General Practice in 2017, Carla completed an MSc. in Advanced Practice (2021) and currently works as respiratory lead in a PCN blending diagnostic, chronic and acute respiratory management across all ages.
Working without age boundaries offers a privileged perspective on respiratory life, health, and disease. As a clinician, co-lead for Southampton Airways Forum and independent respiratory trainer for national and regional education providers, Carla strongly advocates for access to paediatric professional education and the standards and provision of primary respiratory healthcare for children and young people. Carla joined the NPRANG community in 2019 and as a Primary Care representative on the NPRANG committee in 2021.