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National blood pressure role on cards for pharmacy

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National blood pressure role on cards for pharmacy

Professor Kevin Fenton: “We are your biggest fans”

RPS Conference report

Public Health England is considering how to involve community pharmacists in a system-wide structure for the early detection and management of hypertension that it plans to launch this month.

“We can’t rely on GPs alone because of the scale of the problem,” Professor Kevin Fenton, PHE’s national director of health and wellbeing told the Royal Pharmaceutical Society conference on September 8. “I’ve been looking at getting pharmacy involved.” More than 5 million people had undiagnosed hypertension and 40 per cent of people with hypertension were not receiving treatment, he said.

PHE was also planning other roles for community pharmacists, such as a more proactive part in a scaled-up NHS Health Check programme and promoting dementia awareness.

“Public Health England is clear and unequivocal about pharmacy’s role – we are your biggest fans,” said Prof Fenton. “We view pharmacy as a building block in the step change of future healthcare. It is a key resource, offering accessibility, location and an informal environment. It’s ideally placed to make every contact count.”

The evidence builds

Although evidence was building for pharmacists’ wider role, and calls had been made for further research into their effectiveness, Prof Fenton acknowledged the wide variation in how this expanded role was being realised around the country. “We need to understand why pharmacists have been commissioned in some areas and not others. What do we need to do to encourage commissioners to allow market access to pharmacists?”

Commissioning issues

Prof Fenton acknowledged that some commissioners, particularly local authorities, failed to recognise pharmacies’ unique characteristics. And also that some pharmacies, particularly independents, found it difficult to respond to local authority contracts. He suggested developing federations or consortia to share resources. But pharmacists had to adopt a ‘can do’ approach, fully embrace the prevention agenda to reduce health inequalities, and sell their unique offer to local commissioners.

Community pharmacies’ accessibility was important to PHE because it was critical to changing health inequalities. And when pharmacists were commissioned to provide public health services, they often out- performed traditional NHS providers.

Community pharmacy was “a key strategic partner” and had been integrated into all national health improvement programmes over the past 18 months, with a pharmacy representative on all the relevant boards.

More than 3,000 health champions and over 800 healthy living pharmacies could become dementia friends. “The challenge is what proportion of 11,500 pharmacies in England could have dementia friends?”

PHE was committed to supporting the Pharmacy and Public Health Forum, as well as the healthy living pharmacy concept. It had seconded pharmacist Gul Root from the Department of Health to the health and wellbeing directorate to ensure pharmacy was embedded in leading PHE work programmes. It also wanted to see:

• Many more pharmacists influencing strategic decision- making at national level, eg, through representation on the blood pressure system leadership board or by influencing commissioning decisions
• Community pharmacy being accepted as part of the primary care family, working alongside GPs
• Pharmacy as an integral part of the public health workforce.

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