Outcomes of consultation on patient choice to help develop NHS services
Beth Taylor: putting the spotlight on the patient’s perspective |
Pharmacists are being asked to contribute to a Government consultation in England on patient choice.
The consultation was announced in the summer, but the first meetings
of the task groups leading the work were held this week. Based around
a consultation document, “Fair for all, personal to you: choice,
responsiveness and equity in the NHS and social care”, it aims
to find out what people want from health care. This includes what different
people’s priorities are, how choice can be made available to all
and what kind of support is required to exercise this choice. The document
states: “Real choice includes decisions about where and when care
is received as well as what services and how someone wishes to be treated
or manage their condition.”
Eight themes, each with a task group, have been identified. They are:
maternity care, children’s health, primary care, emergency care,
elective care, mental health, services for people with long-term conditions
and older people’s health. Patients form the majority of each task
group, with NHS staff in a minority.
Beth Taylor, specialist principal pharmacist, London Pharmacy Services,
is a member of the primary care task group. She told The Journal that
it was clear that the health secretary Dr John Reid, who addressed the
first meetings of the task groups, was committed to patient choice: “This
is not just one of a plethora of NHS initiatives but meets with his own
thoughts and will be used to inform other NHS policy work.” She
added: “This consultation puts the spotlight on the patient’s
perspective.”
Ms Taylor said that pharmacists should contribute to the consultation. “Pharmacists
should think about how they want to contribute, preferably drawing on
local examples,” she said. One area that had been mentioned at
the first meeting of the primary care task group was an opportunity for
wider access to services through pharmacies. Pharmacists could describe
how they could contribute to providing wider access, she suggested. In
addition, she hoped that pharmacy organisations would contribute to the
consultation, perhaps putting forward common themes in their responses
to provide a more powerful collective voice.
The National Pharmaceutical Association has already written to the primary
care task group this week to point out the central role community pharmacy
has in promoting patient choice. The NPA said that pharmacists offer
schemes to help people manage their own medicines at home, that pharmacists
support patient education and concordance, that community pharmacists
are among the most accessible health care professionals and that self-care
available through pharmacies means that people do not necessarily see
themselves as patients.
The Department of Health wants ideas about how to develop services in
a way that patients and the public want, and how to back up these choices
with information. Views are sought from patients, users and carers, all
those involved in running and providing health care, people in the voluntary
and independent sectors, patient organisations and the public. As well
as national consultation, local consultation will be undertaken by strategic
health authorities.
Comments should be submitted by 11 November and findings will be published
by the end of the year. Further information about the consultation is
available here.
Comments can be made via the website or by e-mail to choiceconsultation@doh.gsi.gov.uk or
by post to Choice, Responsiveness and Equity Project Team, Department
of Health, Room 533 Richmond House, 79 Whitehall, London SW1A 0NS. |
