Ideas for saving money for hospital pharmacy in the NHS.

[hanah]

Hello,

Any new useful ideas for saving money for hospital pharmacy in the NHS with maintaining high standards of care, please?

Many thanks.

[phb10186]

The key is to identify wastage where it exists, and make sure that it is earmarked and dealt with ASAP. This wastage could be anything from too many/ few permanent/ locum staff, to charges for leased equipment that could be renegotiated, to stock issues, to logistical issues, to stock-logistical issues. The key is to have strong, competent management, and for all workers to understand where money is spent, so as to think about it more. It can be the case that since staff are unaware of costs, they act in a way that is uneconomic to day-to-day business.
Not all staff want to be thinking like accountants, but it definitely helps to keep people cost-aware. So, in summary, it is a long process of education and behavioural change, which is not easy really, but will work.

I am currently working on a plan to save Pharmacy a lot of money and resources. I can't provide the details yet for obvious reasons, but I will let you know about it when the service is up and running.
It should provide savings quickly and cheaply.... so please watch this space.

[johnep]

Sack the managers, bring back matron and medical superintendant withsupporting staff as they think fit.
johnep

[phb10186]

Sack the managers, bring back matron and medical superintendant withsupporting staff as they think fit.
johnep

It's not that simple. There are/ were too many managers. That is certainly true. However they need to be 'managers' who manage, rather than just report figures and enforce rules from the DoH.

There are already a lot fewer managers, though I have personally worked in places where managers appear to do very little.

Matron is a fairly good idea, but is not much more than a 'super-sister' with a huge ego, who bullies everyone around.

The NHS became very thirsty and wasteful under labour (a bit like my neighbours Land Rover), though many of us also experienced a good period with lots of work and good remunerations.

Now that we all see that this is unsustainable in the medium to long term, we have to do something about it.

How do you care for an aeging population, maintain and improve care (measured by age specific mortaility/ morbidity data) while at the same time reduce expendature?

It is not easy at all, and I don't envy Andrew Lansley at all.

You can't green-site the NHS, it is too well established, and employes too many people. You also can't get rid of people that cheaply or easily in the UK.

The answer is one of reflection on both the population and the NHS itself.

1. Can we all expect free health care at the point of use for all things forever? If yes, how do we pay for it (it's almost impossible using the current model). If, no, what do we quasi-privatise?

2. How much do you value your health?

Q1. Involves assessing the forecast costs of healthcare, and then playing around with co-payments to get an acceptable public budget.

Q2. is very hard, and that's what NICE are for.

The continuing problem with healthcare is that costs grow as we all age, and as new treatments become available.

The other problem is that is you cut wages, people will leave the UK and go elsewhere - as is happening at the moment. It is called a brain-drain.


If I was a chief pharmacists, I would be looking at where the wase is, and trying to save some of that. At the same time, I would be looking at productivity very carefully.

A lot of the way the government can show low unemployment figures is to create all these silly public sector jobs - so I do congratulate the current government for cutting back so fast, though suffice to say, pharmacy has been very heavily hit while medics once again seem to have got off lightly.

Unfortunately, the pharmacy profession also needs to get a better lobbyist than the PSNC, as they have not provided the profession with good service over the past half decade or so.

My advice to save the NHS money... think like an accountant.

My neighbour has now sold his Land Rover and drives a Toyota Yaris.

[hanah]

Many thanks for the reply.

[crit care]

Hello,

Any new useful ideas for saving money for hospital pharmacy in the NHS with maintaining high standards of care, please?

Many thanks.

from the top of my head....good medicines management..reusing patients own supplies of medicines, getting them to bring in their own medication from home, rationalising prescribing within the hopsital, use of local guidelines/policies so everyone uses same drugs etc. writing guidelines for management of conditions. reusing stock that is returned from hospital wards, identifying trends of usage of high cost drugs, making better use of a pharmacists time and other staff members within the department,

[hanah]

Many thanks.

[johnep]

"The NHS became very thirsty"
Well, from the recent report, it would die from dehydration in many hospitals.
When I was selling to hospital drs and they refuted my argument re some life saving treatment, I would point out that the cheapest patient is a dead one.
Perhaps that is the new objective for the NHS.
Must confess that I had a bottle of water hidden in my side cupboard as kept waiting ages 'nil by mouth' before an op.
johnep