Isle of Wight does paperless prescribing

The Isle of Wight NHS Trust is working towards paperless prescribing across all care settings in an 18 month modernisation programme.

The trust has integrated its JAC e-prescribing and medicines management system across its acute, ambulance, community and mental health sites.

Chief pharmacist Gill Honeywell told EHI the trust has two wards left before it has reached its goal of doing all its prescribing and medicine management electronically.

“We have paediatrics and intensive care to go on the paperless project. We went live in mental health first, which some might see as unusual, but it’s an area which has a high level of prescription so it made sense,” she said.

Patient medication is monitored and dispensed via robotics in the storeroom, dispensary and on the ward, and administration and clinical notes are captured electronically.

The system also integrates with the trust’s patient administration system.

“Part of our improvement programme was to deploy laptops, so we got mobile access to it as well. You can access the EPMA through our intranet.”

She added that the trust has also integrated “inpatient prescribing throughout a number of wards and specialist environments” including A&E, operating theatres and pre-operative assessments.

“This has enabled the clinical teams to easily access accurate patient information and shows that the benefits are not limited to the pharmacy; they are truly trust-wide,” she said.

Honeywell added that the nearby hospice had been so impressed with the system that staff there wanted it as well.

“Medicines are important for end of life care. We are going live with the system in the hospice too,” she said.

“We’ve got no barriers between services, so we’ve got everything coming through and it’s a huge benefit. It has meant we’re able to get all the possible benefits out of it.”

The trust also has access to the GP’s INPS electronic patient record system.

“We are able to view every patient’s record. We’ve been able to do that for about a year now,” Honeywell said.