Video appointments, also known as telemedicine, are being touted by some as a silver bullet for solving capacity issues in ...
As a pharmacist, like many of my colleagues and other clinicians, I have first-hand experience of the frustration caused by poorly integrated or inaccessible technology; I know how it feels to struggle to get the information I need to safely care for my patients. Seeing technology hamper rather than facilitate patient care is one of […]
As a pharmacist, like many of my colleagues and other clinicians, I have first-hand experience of the frustration caused by poorly integrated or inaccessible technology; I know how it feels to struggle to get the information I need to safely care for my patients.
Seeing technology hamper rather than facilitate patient care is one of the reasons I chose to work at Meddbase. From the outset, Meddbase was founded to provide an integrated and easily accessible yet secure cloud-based electronic medical record (EMR) solution – an unusual concept back in 2005 when Meddbase was first deployed.
Of course digital-first health innovations have, over the last 10 years, been at the forefront of healthcare here in the UK and internationally, whether that be within large hospital groups or small private practices [1,2], and we have all witnessed the way in which the Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated the drive to provide effective virtual healthcare. The latest innovation to be built into the Meddbase application, Medication Delivery, helps do just that.
Meddbase Medication Delivery is a new totally paperless prescribing feature within Meddbase. This feature offers straightforward integrated dispensing of prescriptions, with a free delivery service.
This ground-breaking feature builds on our company mission to foster healthier lives, and ensures healthcare remains as accessible as possible through digital innovation by ensuring patients receive the medication they need.
Using the Medication Delivery feature prescriptions are created electronically without the need to follow up with a paper signature. They are then fulfilled and dispatched straight to the nominated address on a same-day delivery basis, at no extra cost.
Through our partnership with Signature Pharmacy, we have already run a successful pilot of the new service with several of our clients and the functionality has been extremely well-received, with clients commenting that the feature is simple to use and ensures patients safely receive their medication when they need it, making clinicians and patients lives easier, and helping mitigate barriers and delays to treatment.
In a world where technology is at our fingertips, and is a crucial part of our day-to-day lives, the delivery of medication and the creation of online prescriptions may seem straightforward. However, with any healthcare provision security and safety is paramount from a data and operational perspective. The Meddbase Medication Delivery functionality is therefore fully compliant with legislation including The Human Medicines Regulations 2012 [3] ensuring it is a secure healthcare solution you can easily incorporate into your organisation.
So, what’s the catch? Digital innovation when not implemented well and integrated into existing workflows has been well publicised in causing disruption and barriers to care, providing a solution to one problem but creating several problems for clinicians and caregivers to solve. [5]
This includes evidence suggesting digital-first video consultation solutions can increase GP workload by up to 25% [4]. It is widely recognised that seamless integration and user experience are key when adopting new technical solutions to avoid situations of clinician burnout and increased workload.
When developing the Medication Delivery feature, as with our video consultation (Telemedicine) feature, we followed a pragmatic approach to facilitating a seamless user experience. We worked closely with our users to design and introduce this extra functionality to the product and into clinical workflows avoiding unnecessary clicks. When asking a recent pilot customer what they thought of the feature they commented that it is “a seamless process, and it integrates with Meddbase really well, so you prescribe, you get a view of what the prescription will look like and then it’s a click and it’s done.”
As a pharmacist and and health informatics professional, I welcome this move toward safer, more streamlined and more effective patient care.
The Meddbase Medication Delivery feature is now available to all new and existing UK clients. If you have any questions regarding the Meddbase Medication Delivery feature or wider Meddbase configuration questions, please do not hesitate to contact our client account management team via email or our support team via our helpdesk ticketing system.
If you’d like to join the thousands of clinicians and medical staff all over the world who use Meddbase, get in touch with our sales team at [email protected] or call +44 (0)20 7482 6290.
[1] https://www.longtermplan.nhs.uk/publication/nhs-long-term-plan/
[3] https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2012/1916/regulation/219/made
