Agenda and minutes

There were no declarations of interest.

The minutes of the meeting held on 21^st November, 2018 were signed as a true record. There were no matters arising.

RESOLVED that the Board agrees to exclude the press and public under Sections 100(A)(4) of the Local Government Act 1972 relating to the private report in Minute 37 below headed “Safeguarding Adults Review” on the grounds that the report involves the likely disclosure of information as defined in Paragraph 1 of Schedule 12A of the Act, as it contains information relating to individuals and in all circumstances of the case, the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information

Report of Sue Davies, Coventry and Rugby Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG)

Jenni Northcote, Coventry and Rugby CCG has been invited to the meeting for the consideration of this item 

The Board considered a report Sue Davies, Coventry and Rugby Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) which provided an update on the development of the NHS Prescription Ordering Direct (POD) service; an overview of patient feedback; and details of the actions taken by the service to address issues raised by patients and Healthwatch Coventry. Sue Davies, Altaz Dhawani, POD Service manager, Ruth Light, Healthwatch Coventry and Fiona Lowe, Coventry Local Pharmaceutical Committee attended the meeting for the consideration of this item. Councillor Abbott, Cabinet Member for Adult Services also attended.

The report indicated that the NHS POD was introduced in Coventry in June 2015 to support a reduction in medication waste. Additional benefits included convenience for patients from reduced visits or telephone calls to their GP surgery and the reduced demand on GP reception staff and GP time. The service was a telephone/ online service which took orders for repeat medication from patients registered with participating GP practices. The repeat orders were transmitted to the GP Practice for approval, electronically, and then sent on to a community pharmacist of the patient’s choice for dispensing.

The Board were informed that the service operated 5 days a week managing an average of 1,800 calls a day from patients. The average wait time was currently 59 seconds. There had been some variability where the wait was longer. The service had been able to reduce stockpiling and waste of unneeded medications. The service currently covered 40 practices with 276,000 registered patients using the service. Additional practices were joining the service in January/ February 2019. The service currently employed 45 trained call handlers on a mix of full time and part time contracts.

The report highlighted the benefits for patients, the CCG and GP practices. There were potential financial savings of around 8% of the prescribing budget (when all practices were covered), approximately £6m. The financial savings for the first three years of operation were set out.

The Board noted that the Service had received both positive and negative feedback from patients, which was logged and used to inform improvements to the service. One of the themes received from callers was that they did not like having to ring every month for their medication. To address this the POD was trialling repeat dispensing for patients with medications that were taken regularly. The POD was also addressing concerns that medication requests were taking longer to be processed by community pharmacies following contact with the POD.

The service had been working with Healthwatch Coventry to develop additional materials which would support patients to understand and get the most out of using the POD. Healthwatch had reviewed the service in 2016/17 and identified the following themes of improvement:

i) Opening hours for phone calls to the POD

ii) Information provision for users of the service and future users

iii) Ensuring that users and future users of the service with hearing impairment and or memory issues could use an alternative means of reordering medication via their pharmacy or GP  ...  view the full minutes text for item 33.

Report of the Scrutiny Co-ordinator

The Board noted their work programme for the current municipal year, noting that the programme would be updated to take account of the request for an additional meeting as detailed in the recommendations to Minute 33 above headed ‘NHS Prescription Ordering Direct Service’.  

Briefing Note of the Director of Adult Services

The Board considered a briefing note of the Director of Adult Services concerning a recently completed Safeguarding Adults Review, Minute 37 below also refers.

The briefing note indicated that the primary aim of a Safeguarding Adult Review was to identify lessons to be learnt from the adult’s case and to apply those lessons to future cases. Following a referral to the Independent Chair of Coventry Local Safeguarding Adult Board it was agreed that a case should be subject of a Safeguarding Adult Review in January 2017. As part of the process each agency could make recommendations to support improvements in practice within their organisation. The on-going implementation and monitoring of these actions was the responsibility of the individual agency and evidence of progress was regularly provided for the Safeguarding Adult Board.

RESOLVED that the completion of the Safeguarding Adults Review be noted, with consideration in full being given in the private part of the meeting for reasons of confidentiality and anonymity (Minute37 below refers).

Any other items of public business which the Chair decides to take as matters of urgency because of the special circumstances involved

The Board were informed that, following the appointment of Councillor Hetherton as the Cabinet Member for City Services, there was a vacancy to serve on the University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire (UHCW) and Coventry and Warwickshire Partnership Trust (CWPT) Quality Account Task Groups.

RESOLVED that Members to consider if they are interested in serving on the UHCW and CWPT Quality Account Task Groups and to report their interest to the Scrutiny Co-ordinator.     

Briefing Note of the Director of Adults Services

Joan Beck, Independent Chair of the Safeguarding Adults Board, has been invited to the meeting for the consideration of this item

Further to Minute 35 above, the Board considered a briefing note of the Director of Adult Services which presented the findings of a Coventry Safeguarding Adults Board Safeguarding Adults Review and reported on the progress against the Action Plan which had been developed in response to the recommendations of the review. Joan Beck, Independent Chair of the Safeguarding Adults Board, attended the meeting for the consideration of this item.

Members questioned the representative and officers in response to the briefing note and responses were provided.

RESOLVED that:

(1) The contents of the briefing note and the progress in relation to the Safeguarding Adults Review Action Plan be noted.

(2) The Chair, Councillor Gannon, to convey the Board’s thanks and appreciation to Robert Lake, Independent Author, and Michelle McGinty, Coventry Council, for all the work they had undertaken in connection with the Safeguarding Adults Review.

(3) Joan Beck, Independent Chair of the Safeguarding Adults Board, to investigate the involvement of Scrutiny in Safeguarding Adult Reviews at other Local Authorities.    

Any other items of private business which the Chair decides to take as a matter of urgency because of the special circumstances involved.

There were no additional items of private business.