Clinical pharmacy teams in acute, mental health and community hospitals have been recognised for their excellence, particularly the electronic prescribing (HePMA) pharmacy team, who delivered a successful software upgrade with minimal impact on patients.
With support from eHealth, under the auspices of Project Manager Dorothy Christison, this has been hailed as possibly the smoothest upgrade in NHS Forth Valley. It involved the HePMA pharmacy team of three people going the extra mile with 12-hour shifts, many additional hours and nightshifts. In the support plan, the wider clinical pharmacy team stepped up to the plate by cancelling leave and altering plans outside work to adopt a temporary shift pattern over a week.
The pharmacy department teams in dispensary, oncology, stores and aseptic made a crucial contribution to responding to the impact of the new system. This included late night response to the later-discharge workload, ensuring that user support on the wards was uninterrupted. Their collective efforts paid off and the senior hospital management team highlighted the lack of major issues with the upgrade which demonstrated the positive impact of everyone involved.
True teamwork and highly capable staff who were given the freedom to think about how to work differently has been the key to the success of this important upgrade project.
