A report commissioned by the Department of Health looks at the ways in which the NHS is working to improve the use of medicines and tackle avoidable medicines wastage. The action plan outlines how best practice could be shared across the NHS in the future.
The plan identifies how everybody – not just pharmacists, GPs and care home staff, but also patients and the public – can stop avoidable medicines wastage.
The report, ‘Improving the use of medicines for better outcomes and reduced waste: An action plan’, covers making more effective use of medicines in primary and community care, in secondary care and in care homes and end of life care. It also looks at how patients can be better engaged in decisions about their medicines and how information about medicines can be better provided to patients and health and care professionals.
Read Improving the use of medicines for better outcomes and reduced waste: An action plan
The NHS Commissioning Board will consider how best to take forward the recommendations in the action plan as part of its medicines optimisation work.
The report was produced by a steering group to improve the use of medicines for better outcomes and reduced waste, which was set up last year by Ministers and tasked with developing an action plan. The group is co-chaired by Rob Darracott, Chief Executive of Pharmacy Voice, and Robert Johnstone, Trustee of National Voices.
Following publication of research into the scale, causes and cost of waste medicines in England in November 2010, the department and other interested parties considered practical next steps that could be taken, either nationally or locally, to reduce the amount of waste medicines in the NHS – see Making best use of medicines
See November 2010 report, Evaluation of the Scale, Causes and Costs of Waste Medicines