Pharmacies in information prescription plan
Pharmacies are to be involved in two pilot schemes to test ways of improving the information patients receive about their illnesses and treatment.
Steve Tomlin, children’s services consultant pharmacist at Evelina
Children’s Hospital, London, said that staff would complete a proforma
with parents and children at the hospital to identify their information
needs and preferences. Details would then be sent electronically to NHS
Direct, which would deliver the type of information requested according
to the preferences expressed. Possibilities include post, e-mail and
mobile telephone text messages.
The same service is also to be piloted through one Boots, one Tesco and
one Co-op community pharmacy.
“There often isn’t good information for parents or children,” Mr
Tomlin said. “Often drugs are used off-licence and even information
on licensed medicines is not always good.”
The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health and the Neonatal Pharmacists
Group will be just two of a number of organisations contributing information
for the project, which will focus on asthma and epilepsy, together with
cardiac and renal conditions.
A second pilot, based at Hammersmith and Fulham Primary Care Trust, aims
to deliver information through GPs’ surgeries and community pharmacies
to help diabetes, asthma and arthritis patients understand their illness
and its treatment.
|
The
Pharmaceutical Journal
Acrobat
Reader