REPORT


Stephen Slaine


and spent over a week in the Royal Salford Hospital. Lynn Campbell, a Carers NI representative, gave me a booklet with a list of contacts, including one for the Stroke Rehabilitation Team in Magherafelt. This became a great resource for my mother.


I


recently spotted a tweet which referred to pharmacy as being ‘as sexy as a pair of below-the-knee,


closed-toe, class II, circular knit, sand- coloured, support stockings!!


For me that conjures up images of ‘Last of the Summer Wine’ and Norah Batty being pursued by Compo! But pharmacy, naturally, means much more to all of us than that...


I’m thinking in particular of one night about three years ago when, at one o’clock in the morning, I received a panicked phone call from my mother informing me that my father had collapsed in the hall, and asking me to come round.


I raced round, took one look at my father, and immediately dialled 999. Within five minutes, two paramedics had arrived. They quickly assessed my father’s blood pressure – which was through the floor – and then rang both Craigavon and Antrim Area Hospitals to see who could take him first.


On arrival at Antrim, the ED Consultant quickly established that it was a burst aortic aneurysm, so he was taken in a blue light ambulance from Antrim to the Royal with the ED Consultant in attendance. On arrival, Dr Baker and his team met my father and they went straight to theatre. But for the professionalism of each of the members of that team of people that night, my father would not have survived.


For most, that is the ‘sexy’ side of the Health Service: the side that makes an immediate difference to the lives of patients and their families.


But the below-the-knee support stockings I spoke of at the beginning have their own role to play in community pharmacy. They are, after all, a terrific preventative healthcare appliance, and are recommended for all long-haul flights to prevent deep vein thrombosis. They’re also – most importantly - readily available at any local pharmacy.


And that’s what makes our role in care in the community so important. And what makes our need to integrate and to make connections of paramount importance.


Earlier this year, my father suffered a stroke whilst he was in Manchester


Then, my father started to attend a Chest Heart and Stroke group at Cookstown Leisure Centre. What a difference this made to his confidence, and what an impact these resources have had not just on my father but my mother, as his main carer.


As pharmacists, we are involved in health promotion and disease/injury prevention. We are also about the care of people with long-term conditions – an area which continues to grow at an alarming rate as a result of our ageing population.


But we can’t do it alone. And that’s why we must focus not only on integration with the community and voluntary sectors, but also with our colleagues within primary and secondary care. Over the next few pages we look at some of the fantastic initiatives that are running in the community, which are facilitating that integration and helping pharmacy to make those vital connections.


The American architect, Charles Eames, once said that ‘eventually, everything connects: people, ideas, objects. The quality of the connections is the key to quality per se’. It’s vital that we make those connections now....


Integrated Care Partnerships Integrated Care Partnerships (ICPs) are not only starting to do some great work, but they’re involving themselves in collaborative ventures in community-facing initiatives...


Medicines optimisation: prevention of unscheduled care The statistics relating to medicines – both adherence and compliance – for Northern Ireland don’t make great reading: • Only 16 per cent of patients who are prescribed a new medicine are taking it as prescribed • Almost 1.5 million prescriptions for tranquilisers and sleeping pills are issued here each year • There are 21 items prescribed per person per year in NI


It’s therefore perhaps fitting that a new regional innovation centre, which aims to ensure better health outcomes for the population through the consistent delivery of best practice relating to the use of medicines, was recently launched at Antrim Area Hospital.


The launch of the new centre coincided with the launch of a clinical study, which was supported by the ABPI in conjunction with Queen’s


Any pharmacy can request assessment for Health+ Pharmacy. So far, nine pharmacies have been awarded Health+ Pharmacy status, after demonstrating that they meet 16 separate quality standards. For more information, email healthpluspharmacy@hscni.net.


University Belfast, and which evaluated Hospital Discharge Continuity of Care – Safer Transitions of Care. Professor Mike Scott, Head of Pharmacy in the Northern Trust, collaborated with pharmacy clinical lead, Jonathan Lloyd, to improve the interfaces in the medicines pathway between secondary and primary care.


The findings of the study were very impressive, with not only a twelve per cent reduction in readmissions to hospital post discharge, but also an improved patient journey and experience with improved collaboration between primary and secondary care pharmacists.


In fact, when announcing his investment regarding putting pharmacists into GP practices, the


then Health Minister, Simon Hamilton, concluded his Departmental press release by stating that ‘this investment is also an important component in delivering my Department’s Medicines Optimisation Quality Framework’.


New initiative a definite ‘plus’ for pharmacy February also saw the formal launch of Health Plus Pharmacy. According to the Public Health Agency, the aim of Health Plus Pharmacy is to use ‘community pharmacy as a springboard for supporting public health goals, working at the heart of the communities they serve.


These programmes are about reducing health inequalities by identifying issues early, making sure people get the information and support that they need, and preventing long-term health problems developing’.


Health Plus Pharmacy is a scheme which accredits those pharmacies which can demonstrate they provide a consistent level of service in relation to health promotion, prevention and protection through meeting 16 separate quality standards under the headings of pharmacy environment (premises), staff development and community engagement.


Mike Scott


Jonathan Lloyd


To date, 440 staff from over 220 pharmacies have received training on the core skills that equip them to become part of Health Plus Pharmacy. Pharmacists and assistants attend live training together as a team, with the assistant going on to complete a Public Health Institute accredited course in public health to become a Health and Wellbeing adviser.


Randalstown Pharmacies Ltd was one of the first pharmacies to receive accreditation and pharmacist, Madeeah Malak, believes that it is >


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