The Pharmaceutical Journal, the trade title for the pharmacy sector, has this week run a story on when will community pharmacies get access to patient records.
In its article, it highlighted how Dorset Local Pharmaceutical Committee (Dorset LPC) was one of a handful or organisations in England, to have been given access: “A handful of local areas are leading the way – or making steady progress – on enabling pharmacy access to a share care records system, with LPC’s telling the PJ that some pharmacies now “couldn’t survive without it.”
Amanda Moores, chief officer at Dorset LPC, which was one of the first areas in England to enable pharmacy access to the local shared care record, the Dorset Care Record, told the PJ progress towards pharmacy access had been “slow”.
“It’s been easier to get the smaller chains and the independents involved,” she says. “There are huge challenges for the multiples … we have to remember they’re having to deal with 40+ different shared care records,” one for each ICS. But for those that do have access, Moores says, “They love it and they now use it every day.”
“One of its most significant benefits is as part of the discharge medicines service,” she says, referring to a service where a pharmacy staff member can check that any medicines awaiting collection are still appropriate for a patient after discharge from hospital. The information provided in shared care records about medicines given to patients after discharge “has been one of the key areas” for inclusion, she says.
“Obviously, it’s a huge issue and also, in terms of patient safety, it’s probably one of the key areas where a difference can be made.”
“For a patient, if the pharmacist can access information from primary care, secondary care, the community mental health trust, social care and soon from drugs and alcohol services, “it feels more joined up,” Moores says.
“Whichever healthcare setting you attend, somebody has the ability to access a fuller picture.”
There are 70 accounts linking pharmacy staff members to the DCR.
- The full article can be found at Patient records: when will community pharmacies get access? – The Pharmaceutical Journal (pharmaceutical-journal.com)
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