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Patient Safety Learning

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  1. Patient Safety Learning
    NHS trust chief executives have told HSJ  they need more clarity the Pfizer-BioNTech covid vaccine is safe to reassure their worried staff. 
    Trusts were told last week they need to be ready to start vaccinating their staff from early next month. On Tuesday, it was confirmed that they would initially be asked to use the covid vaccine produced by Pfizer and BioNTech, assuming it is granted a licence by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency.
    Speaking at the HSJ Provider Virtual Summit, St George’s University Hospitals Foundation Trust chief executive Jacqueline Totterdell said there was a lot of “anxiety” around the vaccine among her staff. Leeds Community Healthcare Trust chief Thea Stein added leaders in her city feel “anxious and uncertain”.
    Ms Totterdell said: “As a responsible officer for 9,000 staff, I also need to be clear that the vaccination is safe. That bit of narrative just needs to come out from the centre, about the reasons why they think it is safe.
    “I think there is a lot of anxiety, and some of the polls we’ve done around south west London show that as little as 50 per cent of people are willing just to have it without any of that [assurance]."
    Northumbria Healthcare FT chief executive Sir Jim Mackey, who also spoke at the summit, admitted he was “a bit surprised” by some staff who said they were not going to get the vaccine.
    The former NHS Improvement chief added: “I think when it actually comes to it, and we get the messaging right about it, not just the responsibility for you but also your responsibility for the people you work with… then the vast majority of people will get it and take confidence in the fact that it’s been developed really quickly and effectively.
    “These things don’t get signed off if they’re dangerous, so we need to embrace it as the thing that’s going to get us back to normal.”
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 26 November 2020
  4. Patient Safety Learning
    A coroner has criticised an ambulance trust after it took nearly four hours to reach a woman who had taken an overdose. 
    Taking the unusual step of publishing a prevention of future deaths report before an inquest had concluded, coroner for Gateshead and South Tyneside Terence Carney said “the real and imminent danger of [the deceased Maureen Wharton’s] admitted actions does not appear to have been appreciated and readily reacted to in a meaningful way”.
    Ms Wharton called North East Ambulance Service Trust to say she was dying of cancer and had taken prescribed drugs, including an opioid-based medication and sleeping pills. She threatened to take more and later called back, appearing drowsier.
    North East Ambulance Service graded the 61-year-old’s call as “category three”, which meant she should have received a response within two hours. It took three hours and 45 minutes for the ambulance service to access her flat, by which time she was already dead. 
    Mr Carney pointed out no attempts had been made to identify family or other support for her, or to contact other agencies which could have responded. The inquest into her death is expected to conclude later this year. 
    In a statement, NEAS said it has already made changes to safeguard patients in mental health cases, including implementing greater oversight in its control rooms, improving call transfers to crisis teams, mapping available local mental health services, introducing more staff training, and telling patients in a crisis but not at risk of physical harm about other, more appropriate, services. 
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 14 January 2020
  5. Patient Safety Learning
    ‘Horrifying and upsetting’ reports of bullying in prestigious heart units are being probed by national officials and professional leaders, HSJ can reveal.
    Health Education England told HSJ it was “undertaking a national thematic review of training in cardiothoracic surgery”, while the Society for Cardiothoracic Surgery separately revealed it was investigating concerns about “bullying, harassment and undermining behaviour” in the specialty following high-profile recent cases in Newcastle and Wales.
    Society president consultant surgeon Simon Kendall, who is based at James Cook University Hospital in Middlesbrough, told HSJ he has been made aware of wider problems beyond those identified in the North East and Wales.
    Mr Kendall revealed allegations reported to the society have included people being shouted at in public, problems resulting from a “legacy culture of sarcasm and public humiliation”, and more personal disputes between individuals.
    The consultant surgeon told HSJ: “The job is hard enough for all of us, without picking on each other and making it worse."
    He added: “It’s the extended team that is affected by these behaviours and it will have an impact on patient safety and patient care.
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 1 April 2022
  6. Patient Safety Learning
    Encouraging diversity in the NHS isn’t simply a matter of inclusion, it’s a matter of patient safety, delegates at the Healthcare Excellence Through Technology (HETT) conference have heard.
    Speaking on 2 October, Heather Caudle and Ijeoma Azodo, both members of the Shuri Network, stressed the importance of diversity when developing new technologies like artificial intelligence (AI). Without a diverse and inclusive team, “unconscious bias” can be built into technology, ultimately putting patients at risk.
    The next step in ensuring inclusive digital health solutions is including technology teams throughout the whole process, Heather Caudle, Chief Nursing Officer at Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Foundation Trust said. “In health what we have done really well is developed multidisciplinary teams when looking at the patient,” she told the audience at ExCel London.
    “I think our technology colleagues are the next member of our multidisciplinary teams. If you think about AI and these new ways of doing things, how are we including the creators and the developers when thinking about patient care?
    “We will have unintended consequences of artificial intelligence that hard-wires things like unconscious biases, that we are only going to treat people that are this age, this weight, this colour, because that’s how we think.
    “Having that diversity on the team will help.”
    Read full story
    Source: Digital Health, 2 October 2019
     
  7. Patient Safety Learning
    NHS England, the Care Quality Commission and other arm’s length bodies will be subject to an efficiency and performance review led by the Cabinet Office.
    The terms of a review into all government arm’s length bodies were set out this week, with minister Jacob Rees-Mogg insisting there is an “urgent need for public service reform”.
    The ‘public bodies review’ programme will consider whether ALBs “should be abolished or retained”, should continue to deliver all their functions, and whether they have an “effective relationship” with their relevant departments.
    Other ALBs include the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, Health Education England, and the UK Health Security Agency.
    A guidance document says: “The outcome of this work should see powers returned to accountable ministers, greater efficiency and where appropriate, the state stepping back both financially and from people’s lives…
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 29 April 2022
  8. Patient Safety Learning
    Lack of staff testing, workforce shortages and running out of personal protective equipment (PPE)are the three biggest concerns for trusts fighting the coronavirus outbreak, according to an HSJ chief executive survey conducted over the last 36 hours.
    Thirteen of the 34 trust chief executives who responded to the snap survey, who were from trusts across England, also warned they would run out of intensive care capacity by next week as the number of coronavirus cases continue to rise.
    The survey also revealed some trusts were already being forced to dilute safe staffing ratios and ration facilities. One chief warned: “We are preserving ventilation capacity by ensuring that only those who may survive are considered.”
    However, the majority of respondents were supportive of system leaders’ guidance so far. Several respondents praised the “impressive pace and detail of the advice."
    The three biggest areas of concern raised by the chiefs surveyed were:
    Lack of staff testing, raised by 26 of the 34 respondents (77%); Staff shortages, raised by 26 of the 34 respondents (77%); and PPE shortages, raised by 23 of the 34 respondents (68%. Read full story
    Source: HSJ, 24 March 2020
  9. Patient Safety Learning
    The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has criticised a new trust’s leadership after issuing it with a warning notice to improve care in its two emergency departments.
    The watchdog warned North Cumbria Integrated Care Foundation Trust that patients were not always receiving timely and appropriate care, while delayed transfers of care had “resulted in significant delays in admitting patients on to wards”.
    The CQC — which carried out focused inspections at the trust in August and September after concerns were raised about risks to patient and staff safety — added there was evidence of “insufficient numbers of suitably qualified, skilled, competent and experienced clinical staff”.
    The CQC also said there was a lack of an effective system to mitigate risks, including infection control in the emergency department escalation areas and on some medical wards.
    Of the trust’s Cumberland Infirmary and West Cumberland hospitals, the CQC said: “People could not access the urgent and emergency care and medicine service when they needed them and often had long waits for treatment.”
    The CQC’s inspection report, published today, also said the trust had an “inexperienced leadership team” which “did not always have the necessary skills and abilities to lead effectively”. It added there were “few examples of leaders making a demonstrable impact on the quality or sustainability of services”.
    Read full story (paywalled) 
    Source: HSJ, 30 November 2020
  10. Patient Safety Learning
    Technology and healthcare companies are racing to roll out new tools to test for and eventually treat the coronavirus epidemic spreading around the world. But one sector that is holding back are the makers of artificial-intelligence-enabled diagnostic tools, increasingly championed by companies, healthcare systems and governments as a substitute for routine doctor-office visits.
    In theory, such tools, sometimes called “symptom checkers” or healthcare bots,sound like an obvious short-term fix: they could be used to help assess whether someone has Covid-19, the illness caused by the novel coronavirus, while keeping infected people away from crowded doctor’s offices or emergency rooms where they might spread it.
    These tools vary in sophistication. Some use a relatively simple process, like a decision tree, to provide online advice for basic health issues. Other services say they use more advanced technology, like algorithms based on machine learning, that can diagnose problems more precisely.
    But some digital-health companies that make such tools say they are wary of updating their algorithms to incorporate questions about the new coronavirus strain. Their hesitancy highlights both how little is known about the spread of Covid-19 and the broader limitations of healthcare technologies marketed as AI in the face of novel, fast-spreading illnesses.
    Some companies say they don’t have enough data about the new coronavirus to plug into their existing products. London-based symptom-checking app Your.MD Ltd. recently added a “coronavirus checker” button that leads to a series of questions about symptoms. But it is based on a simple decision tree. The company said it won’t update the more sophisticated technology underpinning its main system, which is based on machine learning.
    “We made a decision not to do it through the AI because we haven’t got the underlying science,” said Maureen Baker, Chief Medical Officer for Your.MD. She said it could take 6 to 12 months before sufficient peer-reviewed scientific literature becomes available to help inform the redesign of algorithms used in today’s more advanced symptom checkers.
    Read full story
    Source: The Wall Street Journal, 29 February 2020
  11. Patient Safety Learning
    A London acute trust has told its staff they may not be paid for time at home self-isolating if it transpires they were not wearing a mask near someone with coronavirus.
    Staff at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital Foundation Trust were told that if they have to stay at home self-isolating because they were not wearing a mask, that time would have to be taken as annual or unpaid leave.
    Chief executive Lesley Watts told all staff in an email today, seen by HSJ, that a worker had tested positive for COVID-19, and that four staff members had spent more than 15 minutes with them “without appropriate [personal protective equipment]” and must all now isolate themselves at home for 14 days.
    The trust considers it “a serious conduct issue not to wear a mask where you are putting colleagues or our patients at risk – this will be dealt with under our formal processes going forward”, Ms Watts said in the email.
    “If you are sent home to isolate for two weeks because you have not worn a mask, I am now informing you that you will be required to take this as annual or unpaid leave. The four staff members “would not be having to go home to isolate if the use of face masks and social distancing had been in place appropriately”.
    A Chelsea and Wesminster Hospital spokesman told HSJ: “The guidance around PPE has changed a number of times over the course of the pandemic and we felt it was important to be clear on the trust’s position and to reiterate how seriously we take staff and patient safety."
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 28 August 2020
  12. Patient Safety Learning
    We’re living in an unprecedented time and facing new challenges. We’re asking questions we’ve never had to ask before – questions that differ according to our unique circumstances, concerns and needs.
    With an increasingly complex health and social care system, Patient Safety Learning wants to continue working towards a future that is safe for both patients and staff.
    It’s for this reason that we’ve launched Oscar, the friendly health chatbot. Available on the hub, Oscar answers the public’s question about their safety – or that of their family members and friends – during the coronavirus pandemic.
    Oscar is not a diagnostic tool. We at Patient Safety Learning are not medical experts ourselves, but we want to connect patients to the best guidance currently in the public domain. This is what Oscar seeks to do, in pointing visitors to helpful and trustworthy answers, relevant to their specific situations.
    Whether you’re a well adult seeking general information about how to stay safe from coronavirus, a concerned woman about to give birth and wanting to know your options, or a carer looking for advice, Oscar is here to help you find the answers you need. In time, as we see how the public uses Oscar – and especially as we hear your feedback – we plan to build on the range of information Oscar currently offers. 
    Like everything else on the hub, Oscar is free to use.
    Please do send us any feedback, including information you’d like Oscar to provide, by emailing feedback@pslhub.org
  13. Patient Safety Learning
    Women are forced to wait more than five times longer than men for a heart failure diagnosis, a new study has found.
    Researchers discovered women are 96 per cent more likely to get an incorrect diagnosis of heart failure than men – attributing sharp disparities to such problems being wrongly viewed as “a man’s disease”.
    The study, conducted by leading heart failure charity the Pumping Marvellous Foundation, found men said they waited an average of just over three and a half weeks to get a formal diagnosis after their first GP visit, but women waited just over 20 weeks instead.
    Researchers warned such delays were linked to “poorer quality of life, financial losses, mental health issues and avoidable deaths” – adding that health professionals do not give heart failure the same attention and gravity as cancer and other diseases.
    "One of them [GP] actually said, your symptoms are probably not to do with your heart because you’re young and you’re female. Even though my father had a heart condition," says Sarah, who was diagnosed at the age of 42.
    Read full story
    Source: The Independent, 27 August 2020
  14. Patient Safety Learning
    Health secretary Matt Hancock has said integrated care systems (ICS) will be rated by the Care Quality Commission (CQC).
    The government’s recent white paper for a new NHS bill did not discuss any change in the CQC’s legal framework to allow it to rate ICSs, which sparked uncertainty around how ICSs would be regulated.
    However, speaking in the House of Commons today of the “crucial” role the regulator plays in rating hospitals, Mr Hancock said: “I think that it is vital that the CQC has a similar role when it comes to ICSs.”
    The CQC has not confirmed what, if any, legal changes it is seeking. Currently, if the regulator wants to inspect how well a system is working, it must ask permission from the secretary of state to do so.
    It has carried out around 25 inspections of systems since 2017, but has not issued ratings.
    Giving evidence at a Parliamentary committee meeting earlier today, Sir Robert Francis, Healthwatch England chair, said: “A rating [from the CQC] that summarises the performance of the organisation to the public is a form of accountability. It doesn’t affect patient choice in quite the same way as a provider rating does, but it may be a way of explaining to the public how their system is doing.”
    He added that if inspectors are “continually being directed to go to the places the secretary of state chooses” then they may not carry the authority or credibility of an independent process.
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 2 March 2021
  15. Patient Safety Learning
    The UK's biggest chain of GP practices lets less qualified staff see patients without adequate supervision, an undercover BBC Panorama investigation has found.
    Operose Health is putting patients at risk by prioritising profit, says a senior GP.
    The company, with almost 600,000 NHS patients, is owned by US healthcare giant Centene Corporation. 
    BBC Panorama sent undercover reporter Jacqui Wakefield to work as a receptionist at one of the UK company's 51 London surgeries. 
    A GP working at the practice said they were short of eight doctors. The practice manager said they hired less qualified medical staff called physician associates (PAs), because they were "cheaper" than GPs.
    Physician associates were first introduced by the NHS in 2003, so that doctors could deal with more complex patient needs. PAs are healthcare professionals who have completed two years of post-graduate studies on top of a science degree, as opposed to 10 years education and training for GPs. They support GPs in the diagnosis and management of patients, but should have oversight from a doctor.
    Panorama gathered evidence that PAs were not being properly supervised at the Operose practice. The PAs told the undercover reporter they saw all sorts of patients, sometimes without any clinical supervision. They said the practice treated them as equivalent to GPs.
    Prof Sir Sam Everington, a senior practising GP at an unconnected partner-run practice, reviewed BBC Panorama's undercover footage and said he was concerned for patient safety.
    During the undercover investigation at the London practice, administrative workers also revealed a backlog of thousands of medical test results and hospital letters on Operose computer systems. 
    One worker said they were tasked with getting through 200 documents a day, deciding which were important enough to be seen by a GP or pharmacist and which would be filed to the patient's records. One member of staff, worried about making mistakes said they sometimes used Google to help them work out what to do with the documents.
    Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 11 June 2022
  16. Patient Safety Learning
    Suspended Belfast neurologist Michael Watt has offered his "sincere sympathy" to those affected by Northern Ireland's biggest patient recall.
    Dr Michael Watt worked at the Royal Victoria Hospital as a neurologist diagnosing conditions like epilepsy and Parkinson's Disease. He was suspended after 3,000 patients were given recall appointments last year.
    Dr Watt said he recognised the "distress these events have caused".
    On Tuesday, a BBC Spotlight investigation found that he had carried out hundreds of unnecessary procedures on patients.
    The programme also obtained details of a Department of Health report, as yet unpublished, that said one-in-five patients of the consultant neurologist were misdiagnosed.
    Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 22 November 2019
  17. Patient Safety Learning
    "I knew I always felt different, but I didn't know I was autistic."
    For Rhiannon Lloyd-Williams, it would take until she was 35 to learn just why she felt different.
    Now research by Swansea University has found it takes on average six years longer to diagnose autism in women and girls than in males.
    A study of 400 participants found that 75% of boys received a diagnosis before the age of 10 - but only 50% of girls.
    It also found the average age of diagnosis in girls was between 10 and 12 - but between four and six for boys.
    Now charities in Wales are calling for greater investment into services to help better understand autism in females and speed up a diagnosis.
    "The parents responding to the study said there was a marked impact on the girls mental health while waiting for a diagnosis," said Steffan Davies, who carried out the research.
    "Girls represented in the study had a lot more pre-existing diagnosis, which suggests they are being misdiagnosed with anxiety disorders, eating disorders, and that tends to defer from the root diagnosis which tends to be autism."
    Autism UK said this gender gap has long been an issue and is the down to the diagnosis criteria and research used, which has been focused around young boys.
    "Many girls end up missing out on education, because the environment they're expected to learn in is just too overwhelming, while accessing healthcare can be difficult. Women are often not believed," said executive director Willow Holloway.
    Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 23 May 2022
  18. Patient Safety Learning
    A trust which is facing major governance issues is failing to respond to hundreds of complaints properly, with patients and families waiting more than twice as long as the NHS target for responses to their concerns, an external review has found.
    Cornwall Partnership Foundation Trust, which is subject to regulatory action by NHS England, was found to be “not classifying complaints, concerns and comments accurately”, while staff had “no formal training”, meaning complaints were “not investigated appropriately”.
    Last year, the trust was embroiled in a governance scandal in which NHSE investigated multiple allegations of finance and governance failings, resulting in the departure of former CEO Phil Confue.
    Rachel Power, chief executive of the advocacy group Patients Association, told HSJ  patient complaints often contain “vital intelligence” on how trusts can improve services and “essential warnings about any area where things might be going wrong”.
    According to the review, the backlog had stemmed from several factors. These included more work being needed on investigations that had not been thorough enough, and the relevant service teams not responding to enquiries by the complaints team.
    Additionally, there was a “lack of formal monitoring and review” to ensure complaint points were reported appropriately and consistently, and an “apparent lack of accountability by local teams for complaints” triaged through the trust’s patient liaison and complaints team.
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 12 April 2022
  19. Patient Safety Learning
    Healthcare staff in the West Midlands have been told not to start chest compressions or ventilation in patients who are in cardiac arrest if they have suspected or diagnosed covid-19 unless they are in the emergency department and staff are wearing full personal protective equipment (PPE).
    The guidance from the University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust says that patients in cardiac arrest outside the emergency department can be given defibrillator treatment if they have a “shockable” rhythm. But if this fails to restart the heart “further resuscitation is futile,” it says.
    If a patient with suspected covid-19 is in cardiac arrest they should be given cardiac compressions and be ventilated only if they are in the emergency department and the person attending them is wearing aerosol generating procedures (AGP) PPE. That means wearing an FFP3 mask, full gown with long sleeves, gloves, and eye protection.
    The advice rests on the premise that performing cardiac compressions risks virus particles being released into the air that could infect staff.
    Read full story
    Source: BMJ, 29 March 2020
  20. Patient Safety Learning
    NHS Trusts have spent nearly £20 million in four years battling whistleblowers, defending claims of workplace discrimination and fighting employment disputes, the Sunday Telegraph can disclose.
    Data obtained through Freedom of Information (FOI) has revealed that a minority of healthcare trusts, often advised by the same law firms, are repeatedly running up huge legal bills.
    Former health minister Sir Norman Lamb said some of the NHS employment cases he has witnessed in the last eighteen months involved ‘scandalous’ uses of public money. “It is not all NHS trusts in the country, but there are a small number where the culture is clearly wrong,” said Sir Norman.
    Commenting on the findings, Tim Farron, former leader of the Liberal Democrats, who has fought for whistleblowers in his own constituency,  said: “Millions of pounds of tax payers’ money is being spent across our health service by NHS Trusts defending their actions in employment tribunals in cases of discrimination and unfair dismissal. It is only right that questions are being asked."
    Read full story
    Source: The Telegraph, 1 February 2020
  21. Patient Safety Learning
    A former senior NHS official plans to sue the organisation after he had to pay a private hospital £20,000 for potentially life-saving cancer surgery because NHS care was suspended due to COVID-19.
    Rob McMahon, 68, decided to seek private treatment after Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS trust told him that he would have to wait much longer than usual for a biopsy. He was diagnosed with prostate cancer after an MRI scan on 19 March, four days before the lockdown began.
    McMahon was due to see a consultant urologist on 27 March but that was changed to a telephone consultation and then did not take place for almost two weeks.
    “At that appointment, the consultant said: ‘Don’t worry, these things are slow-growing. You’ll have a biopsy but not for two or three months.’ I thought, ‘that’s a long time’, so decided to see another consultant privately for a second opinion.”
    A PET-CT scan confirmed that he had a large tumour on both lobes of the prostate and a biopsy showed the cancer was at risk of breaking out of the prostate capsule and spreading into his body. He then paid to undergo a radical prostatectomy at a private Spire hospital.
    “This is care that I should have had on the NHS, not something that I should have had to pay for myself. I had an aggressive cancer. I needed urgent treatment – there was no time to waste,”, he said. “With the pandemic, he added, “it was almost like a veil came down over the NHS. He worked for the NHS for 17 years as a manager in hospitals in London, Birmingham and Redditch, Worcestershire, and was the chief executive of an NHS primary care trust in Leicester.”
    Mary Smith of Novum Law, McMahon’s solicitors, said: “Unfortunately, Rob’s story is one of many we are hearing about from cancer patients who have been seriously affected by the disruption to oncology services as a result of COVID-19."
    Read full story
    Source: The Guardian, 11 July 2020
     
  22. Patient Safety Learning
    NHS trusts could be asked to create shared waiting lists for elective care under plans being considered by national leaders.
    HSJ understands that NHS England chief executive Sir Simon Stevens is to write to all NHS organisations early next month to lay out plans for phase three of the recovery from covid. The letter is expected to focus on the importance of working at a system level to get more services up and running.
    Senior NHS sources said the recovery plans are likely to include proposals for creating pooled system-level waiting lists between trusts, but there is still internal debate over the extent to which changes could effectively be mandated; for example, by attaching significant incentive funds. The move appears to be aimed at ensuring an “equitable level of care” across a patch.
    In a statement, NHSE said individual providers’ would ultimately still have responsibility and accountability for their waiting lists, even where this might be “supplemented” by system-wide arrangements.
    Read more
    Source: HSJ, 19 June 2020
  23. Patient Safety Learning
    Initiatives to increase staff engagement and make leadership teams more approachable have helped to improve NHS trusts’ ratings from the health and social care watchdog, a report by NHS Providers has found.
    Trusts’ performance has gradually improved, showed the results of inspections by the Care Quality Commission (CQC). In 2014, the year that the CQC began rating trusts, 24 of 35 trusts inspected (68%) were designated “requires improvement” or “inadequate.” Five years later, most of the 224 trusts inspected (59%) were rated “good” or “outstanding.”
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: BMJ, 10 October 2019
  24. Patient Safety Learning
    A healthcare app which was investigated over failing to meet clinical and governance standards has been dropped by north London commissioners after it was deemed “clinically unsafe”.
    The Health Help Now app, currently used in eight north London boroughs, will be scrapped by the end of June and patients will be directed to the NHS app.
    In a statement, the North West London Collaboration of Clinical Commissioning Groups said it decided to carry out a review of the app as it had low uptake and dwindling funds, despite reporting in 2017 that it was being used by 500,000 patients. 
    During the reivew, stakeholders told commissioners that a lack of clinical oversight meant the app was “unsafe” and financial constraints meant it was unsustainable.
    Read full story
    Source: HSJ, 26 June 2020
  25. Patient Safety Learning
    Previously offered as prescription only, estradiol tablets, sold under the brand name Gina10, will now be available to women over the age of 50 who have not had a period for more than a year, as part of hormone replacement therapy treatment (HRT).
    Pharmacists have been offered training to identify who needs the tablets.
    The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) made the decision as part of a strategy to make menopause treatment more accessible for women.
    Estradiol tablets treat vaginal symptoms caused by a lack of oestrogen, such as dryness, soreness, itching, burning and uncomfortable sex.
    The product is inserted into the vagina rather than taken by mouth.
    MHRA chief healthcare quality and access officer Dr Laura Squire called the move a "landmark reclassification for millions of women in the UK".
    "In reaching this decision, we have seen positive support from a wide range of people, including many women aged 50 years and above who could benefit from this decision," she said.
    The MHRA hopes the move will relieve pressure on front-line NHS services and give women more freedom in choosing treatments that work for them.
    Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 8 September 2022
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