COMMUNITY PHARMACY TEAM OF THE YEAR
Steve Anderson, Managing Director, Phoenix (far right) pictured with the award- winning team from Davidsons Chemists, Bridge of Earn.
DAVIDSONS CHEMISTS, BRIDGE OF EARN
D
avidsons Chemists is the largest independent multiple chain in Scotland with 40 branches. Bridge of Earn (BOE) is a
small town in Perthshire with a population of approximately 2,500. The pharmacy serves a population of around 3,500-4,000 patients, with significant numbers of elderly patients and young families.
Over the past ten years, Andrew Watson and his team have faced many challenges in Bridge of Earn (BOE), some planned and some unexpected, but when it was announced that the local GP surgery was to close in August of last year, with only eight days’ notice, the team immediately pulled together.
‘This was going to be a very challenging time for everyone,’ Andrew told SP, ‘but I was confident that every member of our pharmacy team would
28 - SCOTTISH PHARMACIST
pull together during this crisis and maintain the high standards that we set for ourselves in order to help our patients.
‘Liaising with our Superintendent Pharmacist, we felt it was important that we attend a local Community Council meeting that was being held in the local Church hall to discuss the implications of the closure of the surgery in BOE. Prior to this meeting we identified that one of the main concern’s patients had was that there had been no official communication regarding the closure of the surgery.
‘Patients felt they’d been left in the dark, as, other than the poster on the door of the surgery or Facebook posts they had received no communication regarding the closure of the surgery. There were rumours that the pharmacy would be closing as well. We felt it was essential to
ensure that the information we were providing was quick, accurate and widely available.
‘Our Head Office liaised with the team and me to come up with a Davidsons’ statement to ensure that we could provide accurate information quickly and effectively. We posted the statement on our social media pages and printed thousands of copies in order to share this with our local population.
‘I had the opportunity to speak at the meeting and wanted to convey that our team was going nowhere. We were going to be here to re-assure, support and help the local population to the best of our ability. The continuation of care for the patient had to be our primary concern. The community would be turning to us for answers to a multitude of questions they would have. I left this meeting with great pride as I heard a patient describe their disappointment at losing one primary care service
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