Hospital Pharmacist
2007;14:5-6
January 2007

5 NPSA set to overhaul its National Reporting and Learning System Redesigning the National Patient Safety Agency's National Reporting and Learning System (NRLS) is one of the recommendations of 'Safety first: a report for patients, clinicians and health care managers,' published last month by the Department of Health
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5 DoH plan predicts excess NHS jobs By 2010 there will be more health professionals than the NHS can afford to employ. This is according to a draft of the NHS pay and workforce strategy for 2008-11 that was reported in the Health Service Journal earlier this month
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6 Section 60 Order now published as law The Pharmacists and Pharmacy Technicians Order 2007 has finally been published as a draft Statutory Instrument. Following debates on the Order in both houses of parliament, the Order is expected to be made at a Privy Council meeting on 7 February
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6 Extent of drug errors in mental health unknown The scale, cause and outcome of medication errors in mental health care is not really known, according to recent research published
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5 NEWS IN BRIEF
Hospital Pharmacist 2007;14:5

Soraya Dhillon, chair of Luton and Dunstable Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and head of the University of Hertfordshire’s school of pharmacy, was made MBE in the New Year’s honours list.

Among those designated as fellows of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society last month are Stephen Bazire, pharmacy services director for Norfolk and Waveney Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust, Ray Fitzpatrick, clinical director of pharmacy at the Royal Wolverhampton Hospitals NHS Trust, and John Timmins, clinical director of pharmacy and medicines management for Sheffield Children’s NHS Foundation Trust.

Two new online databases were launched last month by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence, to support the implementation of its guidance.
• Shared learning: implementing NICE guidance
• Evaluation and review of NICE implementation evidence (ERNIE)

Guidance on covert medication — the practice of hiding patients’ medicines in food or drink — was published last month by the Mental Welfare Commission for Scotland. The guidance, mainly aimed at care homes, states that a pharmacist’s advice must be sought on crushing tablets or combining medicines with food or drink.

Payment by Results guidance for 2007/08 was published by the Department of Health last month. In addition, an Audit Commission report outlines pilot results from testing aspects of the proposed assurance framework for England