PJ Online | MM: "PSNC" project moves forward

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Medicines Management
Issue no 6, p6
November/December 2002

Features

"PSNC" project moves forward

Helen Rhodes updates readers on the Community Pharmacy Medicines Management Project

Helen Rhodes is manager of the Community Pharmacy Medicines Management Project

The Community Pharmacy Medicines Management Project is well underway in the nine pilot areas of Nantwich, Walsall, Portsmouth, Poole, North Southwark, Salford, Lichfield, North Tyneside and Shipley & Baildon.

The Project is often referred to as the PSNC project and, although this does differentiate it from the National Prescribing Centre Medicines Management Collaborative Project, it is not only the PSNC that is supporting it. The NPA, RPSGB, Co-operative Pharmacy Technical Panel and Company Chemists Association each have a senior member on the project board. The pilot phase was completed in the summer and since then the pilot areas have been preparing for the main phase. This has involved the GP practices inviting patients on their coronary heart disease register to take part in the study.

Once patients have agreed to participate, core baseline data is extracted from their medical records and transferred to an intervention form, which is then sent to the pharmacy. The pharmacist then makes an appointment with the patient and follows up any recommendations with the GP.

The study is a randomised control trial, which involves patients in an intervention group being seen by the community pharmacist and patients in a control group who receive their usual medical and pharmaceutical care.

A research consortium that includes teams from Aberdeen, Keele and Nottingham universities together with the College of Pharmacy Practice (CPP) are evaluating the project.

The purpose of the project is: to test the feasibility of introducing an intervention process into the relationship between the community pharmacist, the patient and the GP; and also to evaluate the extent to which the aim of the process has been achieved.

Clinical appropriateness will be evaluated using data abstracted from medical and pharmacy clinical records. Opinions of patients and healthcare professionals will also be assessed.The pharmacists involved in the project have undertaken additional training in communications and on CHD. The training has been delivered by the CPPE (Medicines Management 2002; 4:15) and is being evaluated by the CPP.

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