LAST night's Federal Budget lays the foundations required to rebuild Australia's aged care sector, but more need to be done to boost medicines safety, the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia (PSA) believes.
PSA National President, Associate Professor Chris Freeman, welcomed the Government's $17.7 billion investment in aged care, in response to the findings of the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety.
"The Morrison Government has laid the foundation for rebuilding our aged care system from the ground up," he said.
"[But] more must be done to reduce avoidable hospital admissions and deaths caused by medicines and help to restore faith and trust in the aged care sector.
"Residents in aged care facilities deserve to have timely and regular access to the expertise of a pharmacist if they require advice and support with their medicines and medicine management.
"Having pharmacists on the ground within aged care facilities must happen if we are serious about improving medicine management and resident safety.
"Pharmacists as custodians of medicine safety must play a key role in bridging the divide between healthcare and aged care, to reduce harmful medicine use and improve quality of life for older Australians."
Meanwhile, Macquarie University Director of the Centre for Health Systems and Safety, Professor Johanna Westbrook, called for better use of data in the aged care sector.
"While residential aged care providers remain data rich but information poor, people will continue to suffer pressure ulcers, mistakes in their medication administration and poor care," she said.
Westbrook called on researchers, government, aged care providers and the IT sector to work together to design effective and compassionate solutions to optimise the use of information to improve medication use patterns.
The above article was sent to subscribers in Pharmacy Daily's issue from 12 May 21
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