Torbay and South Devon deploys Dedalus ePMA solution

Torbay and South Devon NHS Foundation Trust has rolled out an Electronic Prescribing and Medicines Administration (ePMA) solution.

The solution, supplied by Dedalus, was introduced on six medical wards, one ambulatory unit and two emergency admissions units in January.

Dedalus’ ePMA system was deployed on both tablets and laptops for use at the bedside and on the drugs trolley and is being used by pharmacists, nurses and doctors.

The aim is to improve clinical processes and reduce the chance of prescribing errors.

Gill Otway, IT programme manager at the trust, said: “The preparation for the roll-out was very thorough with as much clinical process evaluation, system configuration and pre-event training done as possible – although some training still inevitably had to be done during the weekend for bank nurses etc.

“It was a superb team effort with all key staff well prepared in advance and the wards fully expecting and ready for the change.

“Plus, there was a lot of behind-the-scenes support of our ePMA in Procurement and from Mike Green our CCIO.”

In February 2018, the government promised to invest £75million to help accelerate the roll out of e-prescribing systems across the NHS.

The then health secretary, Jeremy Hunt, said the investment was “to help hospitals progress” with implementing such systems.

He said: “We know that if you move to electronic prescribing systems rather than paper-based systems that we still have in many hospitals we can eliminate around half of errors.”