WINNER - Improving work flow in Pharmacy Stores at Glangwili General Hospital

Hywel Dda University Health Board

A survey conducted showed that 47% of pharmacy staff in Glangwili General Hospital were feeling symptoms of burnout and 46% were feeling stressed in their day-to-day roles. Burnout leads to reduced levels of staff engagement which leads to lower productivity, reduced patient experience and an increased risk of accidents within the workplace.

Workshops took place to understand the issues staff were facing and for staff to provide any ideas as solutions for the issues raised. From these workshops, one of the key issues identified was that an average of 26 items were being requested as ad-hoc stock per day from Pharmacy Stores - indicating a system workflow failure.

Once Stores were identified as the area for the service improvement project, a stakeholder analysis was carried out to highlight the members of staff who would be involved in this service improvement. The appropriate staff members identified included the Assistant Technical Officers, newly qualified band 4 pharmacy technicians, the procurement and stores pharmacy technician, senior pharmacy technician and pharmacists. A discussion was carried out with these members to understand what solutions could help to reduce the number of ad-hoc stock requests.

Through a series of Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycles, workflow improvements have been made within Pharmacy Stores, and appropriate training provided, to reduce the number of ad-hoc stock item requests. This has led to an efficiency improvement in the management of stock on hospital wards, reducing the number of missed doses of patients' medication. In turn, this has helped to improve staff satisfaction and wellbeing, and the service provided by Pharmacy Stores to the wards.

Now that the changes within the pharmacy department have been completed, the next step is to manage external changes, working to support those wards which sent the most stock request forms and requested most items for ad-hoc stock.

Catrin Evans

catrin.evans90db3@wales.nhs.uk