MOOP programme wins UK award

MOOP programme wins UK award

The Medicines Optimisation in Older People (MOOP) team was announced as the winner of the ‘Making Health and Social Care Patient friendly’ category at the AbbVie 2017 Sustainable Healthcare ‘Patients as Partners’ Awards. The award was presented by Carrie Grant, Patient Advocate, at the annual sustainable healthcare conference at The King’s Fund in London. The conference focused on how proven innovation can be spread across the NHS more quickly.

Cost saving on medicines

The MOOP programme was recognised for its outstanding achievements, demonstrating improvements in the optimisation of medicines for older people in private care homes and reablement wards, where clinical pharmacy is not normally available. By joining up care it has had significant benefits for older people including a 14% drop in inappropriate presentations to Emergency Departments and a decrease in adverse drug events. Cost saving on medicines of £141-180 per patients could realise an estimated £41-52 million saving if spread to all care homes in England and Wales. The approach has already been rolled out to all five Health Trusts in Northern Ireland.
The MOOP programme is jointly run by Western and Northern Health & Social Care Trusts (HSCT).

“This project is to be congratulated for the way it brings together different services around the needs of the patient and delivers evidence based results, which are cost effective and scalable”

Sue Farringdon, Chair of the Patients Information Forum

High quality pharmaceutical focus

As a winner in the this category, the team will receive a bursary of up to £3000 to spend on research to grow their own experience and share best practice that will benefit patients and/or the NHS.
Carmel Darcy, Consultant Pharmacist at Western HSCT, said: “I am absolutely delighted for the team that we have won this award. Our project continues to deliver a high quality pharmaceutical focus for older people across Northern Ireland. Until now no project has accepted a holistic responsibility for the many medicines prescribed to our older people. By navigating the many prescribers and specialists involved in the care of the older people they encounter, our team places what matters to the patient at the centre of every medicine decision.”

Category Judge – Sue Farringdon, Chair of the Patients Information Forum said: “This project is to be congratulated for the way it brings together different services around the needs of the patient and delivers evidence based results, which are cost effective and scalable. The project tackled a clear unmet where previously there was no point of contact for patients, carers and staff and a high rate of inappropriate presentation of these patients to Trust A&E departments. The project refined and tested models, involving Consultant Pharmacist led case management and brought together GP Practices, care home managers, intermediate care, and specialist nurses and patients.”

Sustainable healthcare

The awards were created by AbbVie to recognise, celebrate and raise awareness of good examples of improvements that demonstrate clear benefit to the lives of patients and make our health services more sustainable.
Jerome Bouyer, UK General Manager, AbbVie commented: “The AbbVie Sustainable Healthcare Initiative develops ways to achieve better healthcare outcomes and experience for people living with long-term conditions while also making best use of limited resources. Whatever we at AbbVie can do to identify and support those who are providing great public services that allows system efficiencies is, we hope, a useful contribution.”

The full shortlisted finalists were:

  • WINNER: Medicines Optimisation in Older People – Western & Northern Health and Social Care Trust Trusts
  • FINALIST: Cheshire and Merseyside Palliative Care Audit – North West Coast Strategic Clinical Network
  • FINALIST: Community Linking Project – St Albans and Crowhall Medical Groups/Edberts House

More on the awards, click on AbbVie 2017.
Location: AbbVie 2017 Sustainable Healthcare ‘Patients as Partners’ Awards at The King’s Fund, London on 28 November 2017.

MOIC hosts Spanish pharmacists

MOIC hosts Spanish pharmacists

MOIC and Antrim Hospital Pharmacy Department hosted two hospital pharmacists from Spain. Alice Charlotte Viney (Resident pharmacist, Hospital General Universitario Santa Lucia de Cartagena) and Maria Teresa Pérez Maroto (Specialist pharmacist, Hospital Universitario de Guadalajara) visited for three weeks from 6-24 November 2017. The visit was part of the International Centres of Excellence in Hospital Pharmacy Programme developed by the Spanish Society of Hospital Pharmacy (SEFH).

Picture above, left: Alice Charlotte Viney (Resident pharmacist, Hospital General Universitario Santa Lucia de Cartagena). Right: Maria Teresa Pérez Maroto (Specialist pharmacist, Hospital Universitario de Guadalajara).

MOIC features in Scale AHA final report

MOIC features in Scale AHA final report

MOIC is featured in the recently published final report of Scale AHA on European Innovation Partnership on Active and Healthy Ageing (EIP on AHA).

MOIC featured as an Originator Reference Site, twinning with the Adopter Reference Sites: Institut Catala de Salut, Catalonia; Czech National eHealth Centre, Olomouc and NHS Innovation Agency North West of England, North West Coast of England.  The innovative practice featured by MOIC was STEPSelect, the innovative interactive web-based platform for rational medicines selection.

Twinning regions

Scale AHA supported the European Commission in fostering ‘Scaling up of innovations in active and healthy ageing’ by engaging stakeholders of the European Innovation Partnership on Active and Healthy Ageing.

Scale AHA also conducted the ‘2016 Transfer of Innovation Scheme’ supporting European regions to learn from one another and scale up digitally-enabled innovative ICT solutions in active and healthy ageing. Twenty pairs of regions were provided with financial support for twinning activities. The scheme is a new concept aiming to de-risk investment in digital innovative ICT solutions by financing small but concrete ideas with high potential for replicability and scaling up. The Scale AHA report provides an overview of all the different study activities and results, as well as policy recommendations. More on Scale-AHA, visit their website.

Click on Study on support to scaling-up of innovations in Active and Healthy Ageing to view the full final report.

Leaders in Healthcare 2017 conference in Liverpool

Leaders in Healthcare 2017 conference in Liverpool

At the Leaders in Healthcare 2017 Conference in Liverpool Anita Hogg presented the poster ‘Medicines Optimisation – Role of an Innovation Centre’. The MOIC video was shown at the event and featured as a video poster on the Leaders in Healthcare YouTube channel.

The theme of the event was ‘Developing Leaders, building networks, inspiring innovation’ and focused on helping aspiring leaders and those already in leadership positions to develop and improve their skills, make connections with like-minded people and get inspired by leaders from both healthcare and industry.
Thousands of delegates attended the event and more than 170 projects were presented during the conference, showcasing the latest knowledge and solutions to support the future of healthcare leadership and management.

Location: Leaders in Healthcare 2017 Conference, 31 October – 1 November, Arena and Convention Centre (ACC), Liverpool. More information: Leaders in Healthcare 2017.

MOIC hosts hospital pharmacists from China

MOIC hosts hospital pharmacists from China

MOIC was delighted to host three hospital pharmacists from China on Thursday 19 October 2017.
During the visit Mike Scott delivered a presentation on Medicines Optimisation in Northern Ireland and current MOIC projects. Discussions also included antimicrobial stewardship in NHSCT. The group had the opportunity to visit one of the wards in Antrim Hospital and meet clinical pharmacy teams.