The 20th congress of EPHA member the European Association of Hospital Pharmacists (EAHP) took place in Hamburg on 25-27 March 2015. This year’s focus was ’patient safety first’, and various sessions explored how hospital pharmacists can contribute to the patient journey, for example by ensuring medication reconciliation and safety and by providing expert advice on treatments and medicines.
EPHA President Peggy Maguire – also Director General of the European Institute of Women’s Health (EIWH) – provided the opening keynote speech. She offered a perspective on patient empowerment through education, citing examples from her own work on women’s health and gender inequity while also drawing on experiences of working with older people and members of vulnerable groups both at EIWH and in her previous role at the National Maternity Hospital in Dublin. EPHA’s work on health inequalities, such as the 2010 European Charter for Health Equity, Roma health, e/mHealth, access to healthcare and to medicines, was also highlighted.
Relevant activities by the EIWH in the area of gender inequity include advocacy for better access for women to clinical trials and participation in the ENGENDER (DG SANCO) and EUGenMed (DG Research, FP7) projects.
A specific focus was placed on health literacy and patient empowerment. Citing Ilona Kickbusch (2001), Maguire proposed ’widening the glossary definition of health literacy by including the dimensions of community development and health-related skills beyond health promotion’ so that health literacy itself is understood as a key factor influencing population health.
The role of patients as case managers was also discussed as both an opportunity (e.g. more informed and critical patients, growing desire to become involved in health decisions, more targeted or personalised medicines thanks to technological progress, increased patient group advocacy work at political level) and a potential concern (e.g. confusion over the validity of online information, non-adherence to medicines, less cooperation with healthcare professionals) for healthcare and health system developments.
EPHA argued that hospital pharmacists are well placed, as members of multidisciplinary teams, to provide tailored advice to patients on medicines given that (community) pharmacists are often the first port of call for patients. More needs to be done to inform and educate patients about the role of hospital pharmacists so that more patients can benefit from their specialist knowledge of medicines, their properties and safe uses. This is becoming increasingly important given Europe’s ageing societies combined with the rise of multiple morbidities and polypharmacy, which underlines the growing need for expert advice.
Crucially, more face-to-face contact with hospital pharmacists could lead to, inter alia, better recording of a patient’s medication history, improved understanding of why, when and how medicines are to be taken, how they interact with other medicines, what potential risks they might entail (e.g. to avoid adverse reactions) and also to provide advice to ensure medication adherence during transitions between healthcare settings and home. Other health professionals including physicians and nurses would also benefit from working together and sharing knowledge with hospital pharmacists.
Other sessions of the Congress reiterated the importance of the European Statements of Hospital Pharmacy that were agreed by stakeholders including EPHA at the May 2014 EAHP Summit in Brussels.
The Congress also discussed medicines shortages, for which EAHP’s 2014 report, Medicines Shortages in European Hospitals, provided a solid evidence base.
Given the Congress theme, many of the sessions and workshops also dealt with patient safety issues such as pharmacovigilance, safe medical devices, barcoding the single dose of drugs, developing a patient safety culture and communicating with patients.
