Latrobe pharmacists quit
June 3, 2013
THE Society of Hospital
Pharmacists of Australia has urged
governments around the country
to ensure that hospital funding is
sufficient to support and sustain
the services required to ensure
patient safety, in the light of the
resignation of two highly respected
hospital pharmacy managers from
Latrobe Regional Hospital in Vic.
Anne Leversha (who’s been
working at Latrobe for 27 years)
and Lyn Billingon have both
stepped down as pharmacy
managers after finding their
positions untenable “because the
hospital’s current senior executive
is placing financial objectives ahead
of patient safety,” the SHPA said.
The number of pharmacists at the
hospital has not been increased
to cover higher workloads since
2009, despite the hospital offering
additional patient services in
specialities such as oncology and
rehabilitation.
Leversha is also concerned about
the need for a mental health
clinical pharmacy service, with staff
numbers not being boosted despite
an independent review last year
recommending an increase.
SHPA also says that “full and
frank discussion about medication
incidents reported at the hospital
is no longer possible,” with the
effective decrease in pharmacist
availability at the bedside
“artificially dropping medication
incident reports”.
Sue Kirsa, SHPA president, said
the concerns of the Latrobe
pharmacists identify issues such
as poor governance, a lack of
focus on standards of service and
inadequate risk assessment of staff
reductions.
According to the Latrobe Valley
Express, the hospital’s acting CEO
Amanda Cameron has refuted
suggestions of unsafe practices and
claimed the the culture “strongly
encourages reporting of any errors.”
However Kirsa said SHPA’s
guidelines indicate that the hospital
would need to lift its pharmacy
staffing by about 70% for patients
to achieve appropriate service levels.
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