Services Database Green Medicine Bag Scheme to Improve Safety and Reduce Waste (Brighton & Hove Area)

Pharmacies across Brighton and Hove and other supporting organisations were issued with green bags between November 2014 and September 2015.

Community pharmacies are a key location for medicines supply and advice. Pharmacy teams are well placed to help patients understand why it is important that their medicines stay with them when they move between care settings and provide the green bags

The objectives of the project were to:

• improve Quality by enabling healthcare staff in the hospital to understand how patients manage their medicines at home; allowing faster admission and discharge;
• improve Medicines Safety by ensuring the patient’s medications are always moved along the care pathway with the patient allowing patients to maintain familiarity with their own medicines; ensuring medicines prescribed on admission correspond to those the patient was taking before admission; reducing confusion;
• improve Communication by ensuring healthcare professionals along the care pathway are all aware when any changes are made following an acute admission; empowering patients to understand the importance of taking their own medicines to and from hospital; and
• improve Cost Efficiency and Decrease Waste by reducing the re-supply of medicines.

This is not a commissioned service.