CEO Blog - January 2015

Happy New Year. I am looking forward to working with the AHSN team, member organisations and partners in 2015, building on what has been achieved over the last eighteen months. It was great to close 2014 with the news the Wessex bid to become a genomic medicine centre had been successful (read the announcement here: http://www.genomicsengland.co.uk/genomic-medicine-centres/). The AHSN Board had backed this proposal, led by University Hospital Southampton with Salisbury NHS FT as key partner, and the Board is committed to seeing the whole of Wessex benefit – the work to recruit for the 100,000 genome project starts in February.

During the next month the AHSN team will continue to develop our 2015-16 business plan – with an opportunity to discuss with members at our meeting on 16th. We will be continuing with our major clinical themes and our wealth programmes. The Patient Safety Collaborative will begin to support safer care across Wessex – making sure we measure the impact and keeping work relevant to frontline staff & strongly influenced by patients and service users.

Further information will be available shortly about our Medicines Optimisation Roadshow on 10th March – this is a joint initiative with NHS England and the Association of British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI) and it seeks to support a real shift in the way we use medicines. Though there are great examples of practice and lives saved every day through medicines use we know that too often medicines are not taken as intended and that we do get things wrong. Medicines Optimisation is about getting the patient’s perspective, seeing medicines as an investment & seeking best outcomes. The roadshows (there will be 15 across England) are aimed at senior managerial, clinical and finance leaders across providers and commissioners.

NHS England is supporting a set of four guiding principles to help patients make the most of medicines, set out by the Royal Pharmaceutical Society. You can read more on the NHS E website here: http://www.england.nhs.uk/2013/05/02/med-opt/

Martin Stephens

Chief Executive