SCOTTISH HOSPITAL NEWS
USING FLO TEXT MESSAGING TO TRANSFORM PATIENT CARE
The greatest ideas are so often the simplest. And right now, NHS Western Isles is proving it with excellent results from the recently introduced Florence programme for home health monitoring.
This system uses text messaging to keep in touch with patients who have conditions that need regular monitoring. The patients – diabetic or cardiac, for example – are sent regular texts asking them for information such as blood glucose, blood pressure or weight. They then test themselves and send in the results.
The text messages are generated by a computer programme but look like messages from a real person. All the results are collated on a web interface which can be viewed by clinicians, in real time, provided they have internet access.
Crucially, if the readings fall outwith certain parameters, such as those agreed in their patient management plan, an alert will be sent to the patient’s clinician to allow for early intervention to hopefully reduce the need for a visit to the GP or hospital. A text will also be sent back to the patient advising them that, for example, their blood glucose is a bit high and what to do next.
NHS Western launched the system, named after Florence Nightingale, for diabetes and cardiac patients in October – making the health board one of the earliest adopters of the system in Scotland (Lothian and Lanarkshire are others).
This is quick work, given that NHS WI only started looking at its options for technology- enabled home health (telehealth) monitoring last July (2015), when it received its initial £50,000 project funding from the Scottish Government.
The system is tailored to each patient by clinicians who adjust the settings, defi ne when messages should be sent, what information they are asking for and how the system should respond. It enables much more detailed and regular monitoring of a patient than routine appointments do.
Ahead of its annual Congress in Vienna, the European Association of Hospital Pharmacists (EAHP) has published a new policy statement highlighting the important role of hospital pharmacists in meeting the pan-European challenge of an ageing society.
Unanimously approved by delegates of EAHP’s 34 member country associations, the statement identifi es 5 main areas for policy attention:
• Increasing the uptake of medication reconciliation and review by hospital pharmacists as a key response to polypharmacy; • Additional training for all relevant healthcare professionals in respect of the particular care needs of older
patients;
• Further embedding of inter- sector communication and multi- disciplinary working as critical approaches to meeting the health system challenges of an ageing society;
• Regulatory innovation to improve the participation of older patients in clinical trials; • Improvement in best practice sharing and adoption across Europe to ensure the internal health system challenge of an ageing health workforce is successfully met.
Commenting on the statement, EAHP President Joan Peppard says, “In the fi rst instance, Europe’s ageing society marks a great achievement by our health and social systems,
5-point plan for meeting the challenges of an ageing society
that so many people are living longer and healthier lives. However we recognise the challenges that are emerging, and one of these is multimorbidity with the connected issue of polypharmacy.
“It really must be emphasised to policy makers everywhere that there is a healthcare profession ready and equipped to assist. As the policy statement we publish today makes clear, the evidence in favour of hospital pharmacist led medicines reconciliation and review in reducing over-prescription and helping older patients manage their medicines is evident. However, as the results of EAHP’s recently published surveys of practice make clear, there is work still be done to ensure patients get access to the clinical pharmacy services they deserve.
“When health system managers think of the ageing society challenge, they should think multimorbidity, think polypharmacy, and think of the hospital pharmacist services that can be further leveraged with their support. Solutions exist, and one of them is called the hospital pharmacist.”
Medicines pricing challenge
The European Commission has published a new study examining differing approaches by national governments in the EU to the challenge of managing medicines expenditure. The report pays particular attention to the phenomena of external reference pricing, and the prospects for a European approach of ‘differential pricing’ according to country GDP (Gross Domestic Product).
EPR, also known as external reference pricing or international price comparison/benchmarking, is defi ned in the report “as the practice of using the price(s) of a medicine in one or several countries in order to derive a benchmark or reference
price for the purposes of setting or negotiating the price of a medicine in a given country.”
EPR is used in 29 countries in the EU, as well as in Iceland, Norway, Switzerland and Turkey, though different approaches are applied in Germany, Sweden and the UK, which employ various forms of EPR, value-based pricing (VBP) and other pricing regulation schemes.
According to a survey from last year, the commission found that 20 of the 29 countries that apply EPR use this policy as their sole or main pricing policy. Countries most frequently referenced to are France, Belgium, Denmark and Spain, followed by
Italy, the UK and to a lesser extent, Austria, Germany and Slovakia.
But the details of how an EPR scheme is designed differs between countries, the report notes, as 21 countries compare medicine prices at the level of ex-factory prices, while eight countries at the pharmacy purchasing price (wholesale price) level.
Meanwhile, the report also examines the feasibility of achieving a system of ‘differential pricing’, the strategy of selling the same product to different customers at different prices, in the case of medicines, dependent on country income (or ability to pay).
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64