The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 270 No 7234 p140
1 February 2003

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Pharmacy staff to ease doctors' hours

Pharmacy staff at Basildon hospital are to help reduce doctors' working hours as part of a new Government initiative.

Pilot schemes are being set up to test different solutions to implement the European Working Time Directive for junior doctors (under which, from August 2004, doctors will be subject to a maximum 58-hour working week).

The scheme at Basildon is one of 19 chosen to receive Department of Health funding from over 400 national proposals and is the only one involving pharmacy.

Geoff Sharman, chief pharmacist, Basildon and Thurrock University Hospitals NHS Trust, told The Journal that the project involved funding for a pharmacist and four technicians for an 18-month pilot.

The technicians will be responsible for:

• Ensuring all patients have a detailed, documented medicine history

• Preparing inpatient prescription cards for review and authorisation by the admitting doctor

• Assessing the suitability for continued use of patients' own medicines

• Ensuring each patient's medication summary is prepared for discharge.

Mr Sharman said that these roles would be integrated into the clinical pharmacy service already in place at the trust. The project would be a seven-day-a-week, extended hours scheme, with technicians aiming to carry out initial assessments before the patient is seen by a doctor. Pharmacists would be reviewing information from the technicians at all stages. Mr Sharman hopes that the majority of patients will be included at the point of admission. "The scheme will mean doctors are less stretched and have more time for patient care," he added.

The trust will be looking at the time taken to roll out the service, the time saved by junior doctors and quality improvements in medicine management.

It is expected that at least 10 hours per day of doctors' overtime at Basildon hospital will be saved by reducing their paperwork relating to patient medication. If it is successful, the scheme will be taken to other trusts across England.

Principal pharmacist Julia Keating has been recently appointed to lead the project, with advertisements for the technicians' posts expected to appear in The Journal shortly. Mr Sharman said that he hoped the scheme would be rolled out from April.

Commenting on the scheme Ms Keating said: "One of the mainstays of the medicines management initiative is the continuity of patients' medicine-taking. Pharmacy staff will ensure patients receive the right medicines from the moment they arrive in hospital, and that information is swiftly and accurately communicated to other health care professionals, including the patients' GPs when they are discharged."