The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 277 No 7407 p30
1 July 2006

Society summary

Have your say on a patient and public involvement strategy for the Society

Earlier this year, the Royal Pharmaceutical Society's Council agreed to develop a strategy on patient and public involvement in the Society. The Vice-President, Gerald Alexander, provides an update and urges readers to take part in a three-month consultation exercise beginning next Monday

In March, the Society’s President Hemant Patel, wrote in The Pharmaceutical Journal about the development of a patient and public involvement (PPI) strategy for the Society (PJ, 11 March, p301). At its meeting in June, the Council discussed and agreed a draft strategy (PJ, 17 June, p730), developed for the Society by independent consultants Ros Levenson, Mercy Jeyasingham and Nikki Joule, working closely with Council members and staff, and with external stakeholders, too.

The draft strategy will be out for consultation from 3 July until 8 September. This is an opportunity for all our stakeholders — members of the profession and many others — to make their views known on what is being proposed. I hope there will be a great deal of interest in the draft strategy, with responses from a wide range of organisations and individuals.

It would be helpful to hear from those who broadly support the strategy as well as those who may take issue with any part of it. We also want to hear from those who have suggestions as to how it may be improved and made to work better to support the Council’s commitment to having the best possible PPI strategy in place by the end of the year.

Why introduce PPI?

Although many pharmacists have led the way in working in partnership with patients and the public, we are sometimes still asked what PPI is all about. Section 11 of the Health and Social Care Act 2001 places a duty on statutory health bodies to involve and consult those for whom services are being provided.

In its Section 11 Policy Guidance, the Department of Health defines involving and consulting as “discussing with patients and the public their ideas, your plans, their experiences, why services need to change, what they want from services, how to make the best use of resources and so on.” The guidance goes on to say that it is more about changing attitudes than laying down rules for procedures.

The Council is committed to the principle of involving patients and the public in the Society’s work. We have seen evidence from other professional and regulatory bodies that better partnerships with patients and the wider public can lead to more understanding of what we do, more confidence in the Society and ultimately to better decision-making. We are also very much aware that both the public and the Council for Healthcare Regulatory Excellence — the statutory overarching body that oversees the UK’s health regulators — expect no less.

At the same time, the draft strategy makes it clear that PPI may apply differently to various aspects of the Society’s work. All the public-facing parts of the Society will want to communicate with patients and the public and make appropriate information available. But some departments will want to engage patients and the public in greater depth, and on a more frequent basis, than others. In addition, some departments may find it appropriate to go further and engage and consult the public on key issues. We look forward to learning from them across the whole organisation as they do so.

As our confidence and experience in PPI develops, we expect greater patient and public involvement in decision-making, too.

Transparent values and principles

Of course, these changes cannot happen overnight and they will not happen at all unless we plan carefully. That is why I am delighted that the draft strategy sets out clearly a set of open and transparent values and operating principles. These will keep us focused as we rise to the challenge of working in new ways.

The proposed strategy also clarifies the respective contributions of patients and the wider public, and we are reminded that it is not enough to hear from a small group of highly committed people all the time. We will need to make the effort to reach out to people who may not have had much opportunity to engage with a regulatory or professional body organisation such as ours in the past.

Although there is a lot of experience in the NHS and in other organisations to draw on, and we have a pretty good idea of some of the factors that make PPI work well for all concerned, we know that the Council, our staff and patients and the public too will all need support in getting the most out of PPI. The draft strategy goes into some detail on ways to support the Council and its committees, the new national boards, the Society’s staff and patients and the public in implementing the strategy. It also reinforces that PPI must be integral to the Society’s work, and not an add-on. Helpfully, it suggests some practical mechanisms for ensuring this.

The Society has already taken significant steps to involve a range of stakeholders. The PPI strategy will enable us to do so in a more consistent and strategic manner. It will also ensure that we use our resources wisely and get good value for money for our efforts. For example, there is ample evidence that having a PPI lead in the organisation will avoid duplication and will help to support the Council, its supporting structures, and staff and the external stakeholders whom we need to involve.

I hope that the draft strategy will generate a lot of interest and that as many people as possible will take the time to respond, either as individuals, through the Society’s branches or on behalf of a range of organisations. The draft is being widely circulated on paper, but it will also be available to download from the Society’s website (www.rpsgb.org).

Next steps

The consultation poses a number of questions, as well as inviting other comments. Taking into account the responses to consultation, the Council will consider a proposed final version of the PPI strategy at its December meeting. Subject to the Council’s approval we will then move on to a period of implementation and evaluation, which we are confident will bring benefits to all our stakeholders — within the Society and beyond.