Helping people become ‘self care aware’
What does Self Care Aware mean?
Many patients visit their GP or A&E department with minor illnesses which could have been treated with advice
from a pharmacist. This costs the NHS £2billion a year in GP time and pressure on A&E is threatening to reach crisis
point this Winter. When people treat minor conditions themselves they do not always allow time for the symptoms
to clear up and visit their GP or A&E unnecessarily as a result. Self Care Aware means helping people identify when
they could take action to treat minor symptoms themselves, and pharmacy can help patients understand whether
their symptoms are normal or not, how long they are likely to last, and when to visit a GP.
How can pharmacists get involved?
Pharmacy Voice has worked with the Proprietary Association of Great Britain to develop a series of condition-specific
Pharmacy Self Care Advice pathways, along the lines of similar information provided to GPs by the Self Care Forum.
This approach provides pharmacy with a great opportunity to align self care advice to the information used by
general practice when talking about minor illness, so patients will receive a consistent message from healthcare
providers. Use of the guides will help patients deal with their symptoms themselves for longer than they currently
do, while information about red flags will help pharmacy teams and pharmacists ensure patients are referred to an
appropriate colleague when necessary.
This programme is designed to recognise the worth of pharmacists in giving advice to the public in these
circumstances, and be of practical help to pharmacists by stimulating thinking in each pharmacy about how best to
deal with patient and public need. By letting people know what to expect their symptoms to do, actions they can
take now and in the future and when to seek medical advice, pharmacists can help build people’s confidence to self
care when it’s safe and when it’s not.
What do the Pharmacy Self Care Advice pathways cover?
Much of what is in the Pharmacy Self Care Advice pathways will be familiar to pharmacists, but the key pieces of
information are the usual length of time that symptoms may last, and the red flag symptoms which mean consulting
a doctor is necessary. The aim is that GPs and pharmacy teams can use the same information to discuss treatment
options and provide consistent advice. The guidance is intended to be used as part of the clinical decision
pharmacists can exercise on the progression of symptoms and treatment options without being a script to be
followed and includes:
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A summary of the common symptoms, identifying when patients should visit their GP by defining ‘Red Flag
Symptoms’, highlighting significant medicine interactions and other useful self care advice.
The actions Medicines Counter Assistants, building on the WWHAM approach, can take to support people to
make sure their chosen option is appropriate, including when the pharmacist needs to be involved.
Information on the appropriate length of time for self treatment if the illness is progressing normally.
Guidance for pharmacists on assessing the patient’s symptoms (including red flag symptoms), their
medication use to date and any further information needed to provide the patient with further advice
and/or treatment.
Information allowing pharmacists to make a clinical decision about the best referral to make if red flags are
present or the condition has lasted longer than would normally be expected.
The Self Care Fact Sheets and the Self Care Forum
The Pharmacy Self Care Advice pathways build on work done by the Self Care Forum. Supported by the Department
of Health since 2011, the SCF is an independent, multi-disciplinary network of healthcare professionals tasked with
running the annual Self Care Week programme for the NHS. The Forum promotes self care in general practice and
its Fact Sheets for minor illnesses help GPs talk to patients about self care during consultations. The Fact Sheets
draw on guidelines from NICE/SIGN, peer-reviewed scientific articles and other well established sources of advice on
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prescribing and management of illnesses to reflect the key symptoms of particular minor illnesses and the accepted
best practice of how to treat them. They also include useful facts about their condition, a description of what
patients can expect to happen, and directions to useful information sources. They are available to download from
http://www.selfcareforum.org/fact-sheets/ and can be used in your conversations with patients as a helpful
reminder of what they can do next time they have the same symptoms.
What is the legal standing of the Pharmacy Self Care Advice pathways and SCF fact sheets?
The National Pharmacy Association has confirmed that its policies are specifically designed to provide cover for their
policyholders in the act of exercising professional judgment. This includes the circumstances outlined in the
Pharmacy Self Care Advice pathways remit, where clinical decisions are made which can result in recommendations
to continue to take medication beyond the given manufacturers indications on packs or information leaflets.
As with all activities, pharmacists must satisfy themselves that they are adequately covered for professional
indemnity purposes and they should therefore contact their indemnity insurers to check their stance with regard to
this initiative.
October 2013
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