Scotland West District Member's Report from Guild Council Meeting 30.11.2000





Before the meeting commenced, Council members observed a minutes silence as a mark of respect to Mr Ronnie McMullan, a Guild member from Northern Ireland who collapsed and died at a Guild event there. The Professional Secretary, Ian Simpson, paid tribute to Mr McMullan who was due to retire next year.

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Scottish Secretary
A meeting is to be arranged between the Professional Secretary and the GHP Secretaries for Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales. This will discuss the remits of each post and prevent, or at least minimise, any duplication of effort.

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Over 50 years on the Register?
District Members have been asked to inform the President of any members or ex-members who celebrate 50 or more years on the RPSGB register. If you have any details of such members, please let me know as soon as possible. Even if you can only supply names of members who might possibly meet this criteria, the length of registration can be confirmed centrally. Three retired members were noted at Council, including Betty Meikle who celebrates 50 years on the register.

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AAH Questionnaire
AAH and the Guild have decided to issue a questionnaire to find out members’ views on the Weekend School and other educational events, to see whether the Guild is providing what members need or want. The questionnaire should be issued very shortly. Please take the time to complete and return it. It is hoped that a provisional report will be available for the Harrogate Weekend School (6-8 April 2001).

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MSD/NPA award
The winners of this award were a team from Lambeth, Southwark & Lewisham Health Authority and LPC and King's College Hospital. The team consisted of Alice Oborne, Vanessa Burgess, Rhona Williams, Sonia Colwill and Gillian Cavell with a project entitled "Reporting of drug related errors in Community Pharmacy: application of a modified secondary care model".

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Pharmacia & Upjohn Award
This award was won by Kirsteen Docherty of University College London Hospitals Trust and the title of her project was "To explore the potential and assess the infant UCLH Trust "Solutions" Newsletter Website".

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Effectiveness of Hospital Pharmacy Research Project
The Guild is to commission research on the above topic. It is well known that pharmacists are worth the money they are paid, but so far no-one has pulled all the research together into one paper. An advertisement for someone to carry out the research has been prepared and is available here. For further details please contact Raj Gokani at raj@gokani.org. The closing date for application is 26.1.01.

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Professional Indemnity
After discussions with the Legal Services Co-ordinator of MSF, an article will be published in the February edition of 'ghp' on MSF support in liability cases. There is agreement that the current GHP statement is valid.

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Storage and Prescribing of Strong Potassium Chloride
A GHP statement on this subject has been prepared and will be issued shortly.

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Technicians Survey
A survey of MSF pharmacy technicians is to be carried out to assess their views on setting up a pharmacy technicians group within MSF.

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Pay
A draft Advance Letter for a two-year deal had been received, but sent back as unacceptable. It was not, therefore, possible to discuss it at the OTC Committee on 1st December. The problematic areas were no increase in the Emergency Duty Allowance (EDA) and concern over the linkage of next years increase to the underlying rate of inflation, which will probably be less than the real rate of inflation.

If it is accepted that there is no increase in the EDA this will mean that its real value will gradually be eroded each year. If the difference between the headline and underlying rates of inflation is greater than 0.5% the offer will effectively be a pay cut! However, it may be that management will insist on a ballot of members on this offer.

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Consultation on Nurse Prescribing
I have been asked to prepare a GHP submission on any Scottish dimension to this topic and any information / comments would be very welcome. Please let me have any comments by 20th Decmber 2000 at the latest.

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EHP Journal
The latest edition of EHP should be distributed next week. The distribution will also include a flier on the next EAHP Congress in Amsterdam.

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AEEU Merger
The consultative poll produced an overwhelming result in support of the proposed new union. The recalled Conference endorsed the motion to move a formal ballot of the membership on the merger. This is expected to take place early next year.

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MSF NHS Sector
The NHS Regional Advisory Committee has agreed to establish an executive body composed of reps from the respective professional groups in MSF health sector. This would effectively be an NHS NEC. No further details are available.

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'ghp'
All District Members have been asked to encourage Groups to submit news items for the journal. If you have any news you wish to see in print, please write or email me.

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GHP website
A small working party has been formed to develop the GHP website. I have been asked on to the group, and would appreciate any comments you have on improvements you would like and information you would like to see available.

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GHPSCOT website
Although a paper copy of my report to Council tends to wait until my report from Council is complete, an electronic version is available on www.ghpscot.org.uk very shortly after it is written. The easiest way to ensure you are notified of any changes on the site is to use the Netmind facility on the front page of the site. Then you will automatically be notified each time the site changes.

Colin Rodden
30.11.00

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