Pegasus post

Fighting over frontline services?

Posted by Stuart in Health news No comments»

The Times reports today on the growing role of the UK pharmacist – but with anticipated cuts to pharmacy services reported widely across this weeks pharmacy press, will pharmacists continue to receive the resources they need to develop their role at the forefront of patient care?

Many reasons are cited for developing the role of the pharmacist with the provision of enhanced services.  Pharmacists have the capacity to see more people in a day than GPs, they are well positioned to review treatments and where GPs are likely to see the ill, pharmacists often see the well, as such, they are well equipped to prevent illness as well as to treat it.

Reports suggest that Minor Ailment Schemes (MAS) will be one of the biggest victims of PCT cost cutting with many already being renegotiated or decommissioned.  The schemes, developed to enhance accessibility to service provision and ease workload of general practice and A&E departments, allow patients to present to community pharmacists for advice and medicines for an agreed range of minor conditions, such as hayfever, coughs, colds and head lice.

Ironically, one of the major rationales for the implementation of MAS’s is to reduce long-term health spending.  Whilst there are conflicting reports on their take-up and success, it remains to be seen whether these cuts are short-sighted cost saving strategies at the expense of long-term financial gain or a reflection of the success of schemes to date.

by Sallyanne

New NHS whitepaper sets out the course for change

Posted by LauraJ in Health news No comments»

Everyone with an interest in the NHS (which should surely be the whole country in one way or another) has been on tenderhooks to see what the new coalition government has planned for its future. But few will have anticipated such radical moves as those presented by Andrew Lansley yesterday – billed as the biggest shake-up of the NHS for 60 years (and it’s only 62!).

Source: nuffieldtrust.org.uk

Speaking as an ex-NHS employee who experienced the first internal market era during the previous Conservative administration, the focus on reinforcing principles of competition between providers and expediting the decentralisation of hospital services through the foundation trust scheme is not a surprise. But the plans outlined in ‘Equity and Excellence: Liberating the NHS’ are significantly more far-reaching and complex than this. Indeed, many commentators have already criticised the plans as being too radical at a time, they say, when smaller-scale efficiency savings and stabilisation are what’s needed to help keep the country afloat. The abolition of the current commissioning structures driven by Primary Care Trusts and overseen by Strategic Health Authorities, with power handed instead to groups of GPs as a move to bring decision making even closer to the front-line, seems to have the support of organisations like the BMA, but huge investment will be required – not least on the part of GPs, in terms of both skill and mindset. And let’s not forget about the wealth of other healthcare professionals – pharmacists, midwives, hospital consultants, nurses – who have an equally valuable contribution to make in facilitating access to the best information, services and advice.

Whatever your views on the economic and political arguments, though, you can’t argue with the sentiment behind the plans – aiming to put the patient at the centre. This has long been a universal ambition for the NHS, as a more participatory society has evolved, mainly thanks to the advent of the worldwide web and the strength of the patient advocacy movement in the UK. However efforts to truly engage all patients are a tall order – the most vulnerable patients who are arguably in most need but find participation difficult are at risk of being missed out or left behind, and good quality information is often lacking even for those who are searching for it. These are issues that must be addressed if the pursuit for a more patient-led NHS is to be realised. And it must of course be done without increasing levels of bureaucracy and diverting resources from the front-line.

Whilst some may have hoped for a more manageable action plan, the one fact is that the need for communications expertise – for those delivering services in the NHS, and those providing a service to the NHS – has never been so strong. Whether it is helping patients to navigate the system and access the right information at the right time, supporting the shifting web of influencers and decision makers to talk to each other, or ensuring access to the latest innovations in medicine and health technology, healthcare communicators will have their work cut out. Bring it on!

By Jo Spadaccino, Head of Pharma & Life Sciences

Welcome Jo!

Posted by LauraJ in Health news, Pegasus, Team No comments»

We are delighted to welcome Jo Spadaccino on board in the newly created role as director of our pharma and life sciences division!

Jo, a former Board Director of Cohn & Wolfe will be responsible for leading our PR and healthcare professional education campaigns for existing pharma and consumer health clients, as well as driving new business in UK and international markets.

Jo’s appointment is an exciting step forward for us as she will strengthen our senior management team and her experience advising leading pharmaceutical companies will bolster our offering in an increasingly patient-focused marketplace.

Jo is looking forward to swapping commuting into London for a short journey along the coast – giving her more time to spend in her home town Brighton, spending the summer evenings on the beach and driving around in her much loved Nissan Figaro. 

Nutty health

Posted by LauraJ in Health news No comments»

The UK has one of the highest average cholesterol concentrations in the world, with as many as two thirds of UK adults – up to 32 million people – living with blood cholesterol above levels that the Government recommends are safe.

So little wonder that any product, ingredient or scientific breakthrough claiming to remedy the situation is big news, and potentially big business for the health industry.

And remedy cholesterol levels is exactly what a new research paper has suggested pistachio nuts have the capacity to do. 

Published by the Journal of Nutrition and covered by the Daily Telegraph among a number of national and online titles, the research found that consuming as little as a handful of pistachio nuts a day could destroy bad cholesterol, ward of heart disease, and have implications for other serious conditions such as cancer.

Research participants ate three differing diets for a month long period – a standard cholesterol-lowering diet containing no nuts, and two other similar food regimes with 1.5 and 3 ounces of pistachios respectively.

It is believed that the nuts, which contain antioxidants – a word seemingly far from both supportive and disparaging headlines alike – including lutein, beta-carotene and gamma-tocopherol, increased antioxidant levels and lowered cholesterol concentrations in the blood upon consumption by the test groups.

Professor of nutrition at the Pennsylvania State University, Professor Penny Kris-Etherton said of the study: “Our previous study showed the benefits of pistachios in lowering lipids and lipoproteins, which are a risk factor for heart disease.

“Our results suggest that a heart-healthy diet including pistachios contributes to a decrease in serum-oxidised-LDL levels, in part through cholesterol lowering, and also due to an added benefit of the antioxidants.”

For the natural health industry, this research presents opportunities from a food retail and product development perspective.  And in these challenging times, such news is always welcome.

Case Study: Training and support for pharmacies

Posted by LauraJ in Clients, Health news No comments»

For parents, head lice are a frustrating problem and recognising that pharmacy is often their first port of call for advice, Pegasus gathered together a group of pharmacy experts at the Royal Pharmaceutical Society to discuss what the key issues are and what can be done to help parents tackle head lice effectively.

The debate was organised on behalf of leading head lice treatment, Hedrin and followed a report it commissioned into effective head lice management in the UK, which found that families have felt abandoned by health professionals, with half driven to despair by head lice.

The group discussed and devised ten golden rules for advising parents about head lice. These rules are currently being edited down by the group and will be used to help train and support pharmacists, as well as offered to journalists alongside the report findings.

To maximise the debate, journalists from pharmacy title OTC and the health section of the Daily Mail were invited along as exclusive media attendees, generating pieces in each title.

Lunching out on junk

Posted by LauraJ in Health news No comments»

Jamie Oliver’s infamous ‘turkey twizzlers’ may have disappeared from school canteens, but there’s another nutritional demon waiting in the wings – the seemingly innocuous lunch box.

According to recent reports, British children eat up to 5.5bn packed lunches every year, but only 1% of the contents of those lunch boxes meet the tough nutritional standards set for the cooked school meals served up in the school canteens. The study, conducted by the University of Leeds, commissioned by the FSA, examined 1,300 lunch boxes and found that 82% contained foods high in saturated fat, salt and sugar. Just one in five contained any vegetables or salad and about half included an item of fruit – although in the majority of cases, even these fell below standards demanded of school meals.

Covered by the media including the Daily Mail, Guardian, Times and BBC Online, many of the reports linked the research to the current obesity epidemic – said to affect up to one million school children – around one in six UK youngsters.  Experts warn that by 2050, up to a quarter of all children will be obese if urgent action is not taken.

The research reflects the findings of the HFMA’s latest ‘Healthy Nation’ survey which uncovered a worrying lack of knowledge around health and nutrition, and a propensity to favour junk food and TV dinners over fresh fruit and vegetables. The survey of 5,000 people found that more than 50% of those questioned claimed that health campaigns such as ‘five-a-day’ have done little to alter eating habits, with 27% stating that they ignore nutritional guidelines altogether!

So with parents already in the dark over their health, it’s no wonder that the health of our children is so finely balanced.  We keenly await the official next steps in addressing this ongoing issue.

Omega 3 – the secret ingredient for a longer life?

Posted by Stuart in Health news No comments»

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By Steph

Eating oily fish can help ensure a longer life a cut the risk of heart failure by up to a third, according to a front page report in the Daily Express (‘Omega-3 is the secret to long life’ – 4th August 2009).

The story, which was also covered by titles including the Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph, was based on a ‘state-of-the-art’ systematic review of omega-3 research spanning over 30 years, and involving more than 40,000 participants.

Undertaken by scientists at the Ochsner Medical Center, New Orleans and published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, the paper recommended that everyone should take the fatty acid for ‘the multiple benefits of preventative cardiology’ – including those with healthy lifestyles.

For those already diagnosed with heart problems, the review suggested that those taking a daily dose of fish oils could have a 30 per cent lower risk of dying early.

‘Compelling evidence’ from the studies supported daily EPA plus DHA intakes of at least 500mg for healthy individuals, and up to 1,000mg daily for those with known heart disease or heart failure.

However, the results were at odds with current thinking at the EFSA. According to Nutraingredients (‘Omega-3 review: Half a gram needed for heart benefits’ – 4th August 2009), the recommendation for healthy people was double the recommended levels determined by EFSA’s Panel on Dietetic Products, Nutrition and Allergies (NDA).

With heart disease killing more than 200,000 people each year in the UK, the results were hailed as a possible breakthrough by charities and many members of the medical community alike.

But what of the VMS industry? With most Britons typically eating just one portion of fish a week as opposed to the recommended three to four, good quality, high EPA/DHA fish oil supplements could potentially plug the nutritional shortfall. We keenly await the public’s response.

PR, sales and the age old debate

Posted by Stuart in Health news, Team No comments»

By Simon

You may have noticed on our new website (and our all our marketing materials) that we are not a typical PR agency, but a comms agency that uses an integrated approach. In this post, a time old industry debate provides the perfect opportunity to explain why.

In the meeting rooms throughout the land and now in PR blogosphere there is one thread that continually crops up – what is PR really about? Well, it’s hard to give a quick and straight forward answer for several reasons:

- PR is a descriptive for a number of different tactics, everything from media relations to key opinion leader development

- As such, it is used by different organisations in different ways

- I am not sure there is industry consensus as to what the answer is

But hats off to one blog, PR-Squared, who gave it a crack and came up with an interesting explanation. The whole entry is here - but the gist is that PR is not sales, it is about engaging people in the sales process. It is about making them think that they must go to that website, call that number or go into that store. But once they are there, it is down to the ‘sales team’ to get the sale.

So what does this mean? Well, to us this means that if PR is being used as a sales tool, then we have to really understand our client’s business. We have to look outside our traditional PR remit and identify potential issues on the customer journey that will prevent the sale and look for opportunities to add value, and then get involved – a great example is if we are driving customers to website to make a purchase, we should be ensuring that the content on the site and purchasing experience is as inspiring as the campaign that go them there. This is why we believe that we need to ask our clients as many, sometimes probing, questions about their business as possible throughout the briefing process and beyond, and that integrated approaches where messaging is consistent work best.

So the moral of this missive is, please don’t keep us in a PR box, our campaigns work better outside it.

Review – Google Health

Posted by LauraJ in Health news, Social media No comments»

Google Health is my favourite online tool this month. Launched last spring, it is still in beta but has started to gain more coverage in the last few months while it expands and new partners join. Primarily, it’s an online platform that allows you to organise your health records in one place. Despite criticism from some quarters, this is still a growing area with 76% of Internet users interested in such access and 26% even willing to pay for such a service (Deloitte LLP Feb 2008). As usual, Google’s offering is the most well known, but there are similar services presented by its competitors – Microsoft’s HealthVault and Revolution Health to name two.

To begin you have to create a personal medical profile by inputting your age, weight, medical conditions, medications, allergies, and so on. Initially this sounds like a lot of work although once complete you start to see the advantages. Firstly, just the fact that all the records are in one place means you get a more rounded view of your health history, but thanks to the Google connection, each condition becomes reference linked to pages detailing symptoms, treatments, causes and preventions; as well as related news, Google Groups and search trends. This means that once you have been diagnosed you are pointed in the right direction for further information and perhaps more importantly, support networks of other sufferers.

Another feature is the ability to share your information with close family, other health professionals or even friends. To some this might be a step too far, but in case of emergencies this might not be such a bad thing. Quite often one of the first things a medical team needs to know is what medication a patient/victim might be on or what conditions they may be suffering from. Could you currently answer this about your close family members? 

The one thing that the service may not help with is the continued trend towards self diagnosis – since the service comes into it’s own after the diagnosis has been made. In fact, anecdotal evidence suggests that the self diagnosis trend might be evolving. Some doctors report that a new breed of patients are not content with turning up at appointments having researched their symptoms, but are now coming armed with their views on the treatment they need too.

It’s still relatively early days, so really a case of watch this space, but in principle I have no issue with the idea and think it makes a lot of sense. As well as the obvious benefit of simply having all the information in one place and being easily accessible, I like the fact that it can help people find a support system once they have been diagnosed. In addition, if Google is accountable for the relevant links more people might have a better chance of steering clear of the hundreds of sites carrying inaccurate information or better still, those self-appointed oracle types we all come across in forums – who can be as dangerous as they can helpful. Surely that cannot be a bad thing.

New mum? A yoghurt a day…

Posted by Stuart in Health news No comments»

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By Stephanie Matson

…keeps the waistline at bay, according to reports in the Daily Mail.  And new research heralding the power of probiotics suggests the area could well warrant further investigation.

Research presented at the European Congress on Obesity found that probiotic supplements consumed during the first trimester of pregnancy could help women to lose weight after the infant’s birth. Scientists from the University of Turku in Finland reported that supplements containing Lactobactillus and Bifidobacterium were associated with less central obesity, defined as a BMI of more than 30, or a waist circumference of over 80cm .

It is thought that the bacteria – which is also found in popular probiotic drinks, powders and supplements – break down sugars and carbohydrates preventing the body from storing them as fat, the European Congress was told.  Just one yoghurt administered every day is enough to help, University officials advised.

The study tracked the weight and overall health of 256 pregnant women, who were randomly divided into three groups during the first trimester of pregnancy.  Two groups received dietary counselling consistent with current recommendations, and one of these received probiotic supplements, while the other group was provided with placebo capsules.  The third group received placebo capsules and no counselling.

A year after giving birth, mothers who received the probiotics were leaner overall, with lower average body fat percentages and less propensity to exhibit a protruding stomach.  Central obesity was also recorded in 18 per cent fewer women in the probiotic group than women who received placebo plus dietary counselling, and 15 per cent fewer women in the control group.

Researchers involved in the trial are now following the health of the children born during the study, to ascertain if bacteria exposure early in life boosts overall health.  We eagerly await their findings.