Society News summary

Pharmacy briefing for Scotland’s MPs The Royal Pharmaceutical Society in Scotland has sent a briefing document to all members of Parliament returned to Westminster from Scottish constituencies in the recent general election...[more]

Edinburgh reception for MSPs To foster relations with Members of the Scottish Parliament, the Royal Pharmaceutical Society in Scotland held a reception at its house in York Place, Edinburgh...[more]

Scottish briefing on pharmacists’ role in helping carers The Royal Pharmaceutical Society’s Scottish Department has published a briefing paper on pharmacists’ role in helping carers to care...[more]

Pharmacy briefing for Scotland’s MPs

The Royal Pharmaceutical Society in Scotland has sent a briefing document to all members of Parliament returned to Westminster from Scottish constituencies in the recent general election.

The document, entitled “Pharmacy in Scotland: creating an integrated, modern and effective health service”, contains six pages of information about pharmacy in Scotland. It is the latest in a regular series of briefings designed to inform Parliamentarians about matters of importance to the profession. The briefing document highlights areas where patients’ experience of using the National Health Service can be improved through greater involvement of pharmacy and more integration of professional competence across professional and legislative boundaries. It also mentions pharmacy’s aspirations to secure a leading role in the proposed reforms of the regulations affecting all health professions.

The briefing points out that, although the Scotland Act 1998 prescribes that regulation of the health professions is reserved for Westminster, the proposed changes to the way health professions regulate themselves will affect the development of pharmacy in Scotland and the relationship between pharmacists and their patients.

The document expresses the view that pharmacists’ expertise in the safe and effective use of medicines should be developed at all health service levels to add efficiency to the processes of NHS Scotland, to improve patients’ access to current and new health services and to improve patients’ experience in the use of these services. It continues: “Central to the delivery of these benefits is the changing role of the pharmacist as a prescriber and how this will be enacted by legislation in Westminster. Scotland’s MPs have a crucial role in ensuring that with the developments in UK legislation covering pharmacy, Scotland’s interests are properly represented.”

The document outlines ways in which the delivery of health care could be improved by making better use of pharmacists in areas such as pharmaceutical care, treatment of minor illness, pharmacist prescribing, support for other health care professionals, services for substances misusers and support for healthy lifestyles. Using three case studies as examples, it explains how better use of pharmacists could simplify the patient’s journey through the NHS.
— Steven Kayne (Scottish correspondent).

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Edinburgh reception for MSPs

To foster relations with Members of the Scottish Parliament, the Royal Pharmaceutical Society in Scotland held a reception at its house in York Place, Edinburgh, on June 13.

Dorothy Crisp (right) demonstrates the use of a cachet machine, watched by Sheila Stevens, David Davidson and George Downie (a member of the Society’s Scottish Executive)

The reception was attended by MSPs from the four main political parties in Scotland (Labour, Conservative, Liberal Democrat and Scottish Nationalist) and by representatives of the pharmacy profession in Scotland.

Welcoming the guests to York Place, the chairman of the Society’s Scottish Executive, Alison Strath, emphasised the importance of communication between all branches of pharmacy and between the profession and parliament.

Topics discussed during the MSPs’ visit included the implications of “Our national health” (the Scottish health plan) and the role of pharmacy in improving health. There was also discussion on the provision of pharmaceutical services and ways in which they might be extended, pharmacists’ management of repeat prescribing, and care for drug misusers. Other topics included the impact of the removal of resale price maintenance, especially in the remote and rural areas of Scotland, and community pharmacy as a major participant in the National Health Service in Scotland.

During the reception, guests were able to visit the Victorian pharmacy museum at York Place, where pharmacist MSP David Davidson (Con, North East Scotland) tried his hand at making pills. Mr Davidson was Secretary of the Society’s Scottish Department before the current incumbent, Dr Sheila Stevens.
— Steven Kayne (Scottish correspondent).

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Scottish briefing on pharmacists’ role in helping carers

The Royal Pharmaceutical Society’s Scottish Department has published a briefing paper on pharmacists’ role in helping carers to care.

The paper is the sixth in a series covering issues of public health and health care in which the Society has an involvement. The briefings are designed primarily for the use of members of the United Kingdom and Scottish parliaments.

Pointing out that a typical community pharmacy in Scotland would expect to have 750 elderly people and 600 carers among its customers, the paper says: “Pharmacists are ideally placed to identify carers and their needs, because most people have frequent contact with their community pharmacist even if they see no other health care professional regularly. Pharmacists are a gateway to health care services and as such are ideally placed to refer carers on to further care services and support.”

The paper suggests that the role community pharmacists play in supporting carers in terms of medicines management and referral to local services is often overlooked, even though it is vital to the carers who visit their community pharmacists regularly.

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