Hospital Pharmacist
Vol 9 No 5 p123-124
May 2002

News summary

Hazel Blears speaking at the guild annual conference

Health Minister Hazel Blears has praised hospital pharmacists for being creative in handling staff shortages. She was speaking at the Guild of Healthcare Pharmacists annual conference in Manchester on 12 April.

The minister is particularly impressed by the recruitment of pharmacy technicians and other support staff to carry out some duties that had been performed by pharmacists. She however stressed that recruiting staff is not enough and that there is a need to provide an environment that will make staff want to stay. This could involve offering incentives such as career options, professional development, flexible working conditions and childcare facilities.

Speaking further on ways of retaining pharmacy staff, Ms Blears suggested that there could be a future role for bonuses and other forms of rewards "for people who are doing a really good job." Team bonuses would reward teams of staff who have worked together to achieve challenging targets such as those relating to quality, efficiency and effectiveness. Ms Blears stated that such bonuses would be designed to reward all members of staff, from the senior managers down to clerical staff. A team bonus scheme is currently being piloted at City Hospitals Sunderland NHS Trust (see p151).

Although Ms Blears believes that pharmacist prescribing will improve patient access to medicines, she is keen to point out that the promotion of pharmacist prescribing should involve patients, and not just general practitioners and pharmacists. "Patients should be involved in an interactive, positive way", she stated. The health minister said that it is important to make patients aware that prescribing by pharmacists is "a better way of doing things" that will improve their safety.

Speaking to Hospital Pharmacist, Helen Remington, immediate past president of the guild, welcomed the comments made by Ms Blears. In response to the minister's point about patient involvement in pharmacist prescribing, Mrs Remington said that patient consent would have to be obtained before a pharmacist would be able to prescribe. She speculated that, in primary care, this could work in the sense that after a treatment plan for a chronic condition is agreed between the GP and the pharmacist, the patient would have a choice as to whether a pharmacist should prescribe. The patient may even be able to choose which pharmacist will do the prescribing. In hospitals, however, Mrs Remington said that it is not yet clear how patient consent will work.

A consultation document on supplementary prescribing by nurses and pharmacists has since been produced by the Department of Health and the Medicines Control Agency.

n Roy Lilley, writer and broadcaster on health issues has asked hospital pharmacists to regard themselves as an important part of the patient experience in the NHS. He was delivering the keynote address at the guild conference. Mr Lilley said: "It is as much the responsibility of the pharmacist as it is that of the surgeon to improve the experience of the patient."

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