North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust (NCIC) has successfully rolled out the Better Meds award-winning electronic prescribing and medicines administration solution (ePMA) in all NCIC Community Hospital inpatient settings.

The Better Meds ePMA solution facilitates the prescribing of patient medication, and the recording of its administration, as well as supporting pharmacy reconciliation and review exercises. It will allow for patient records to be stored electronically and more readily available. The change will eliminate the need for paper charts and prescriptions and the new digital system enables the trust to provide increased quality and consistency of care for its patients.

The implementation of Better Meds ePMA was done in collaboration with CGI.

The ePMA solution was initially piloted in the 15-bed Copeland Unit at West Cumberland Hospital, a community inpatient ward providing medical care to its residents. With the rollout of the solution across the Trust planned to take place over eight months, it was successfully activated at the pilot ward in early August 2022.

With the initial pilot ward activation being deemed a success, the Trust has subsequently rapidly rolled out the solution to several other wards and hospital sites. The solution has now been successfully deployed to seven wards across six different community hospital sites within the Trust.

Miha Zoubek, Senior Technical Support Engineer at Better, said “Having our Better Meds ePMA system live on the Copeland Unit at West Cumberland Hospital is a fantastic moment. Nurses and prescribers liked it so much that the pilot go-live at Cumbria was extended to an additional palliative care ward. Of course, this success would not have been possible without our partners and teams in North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust and CGI. The teams have worked swiftly and collaboratively whilst being sensitive to the needs of patients and staff and can be genuinely proud of what they have achieved.”

Paul Fieldhouse, Clinical Director of Pharmacy at North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust, said “We are absolutely delighted with the ongoing partnership with CGI and Better. The new system is already transforming the way medicines are prescribed and administered across our hospitals. Of all our digital projects, e-Prescribing is the biggest step forward in patient safety.”

Dr Craig Melrose, Clinical Director for Community Hospitals at the Trust, added “The ePMA system has proved to be a really positive step forward for the community wards, it has made prescribing easier and simpler at the same time. It is easy to use and has helped reduce work for prescribers.”

Discover more about Better:

Better transforms healthcare organisations with Better Platform, an open data digital health platform, designed to store, manage, query, retrieve, and exchange structured electronic health records, and Better Meds, electronic prescribing, and medication administration solution. The company focuses on simplifying the work of health and care teams, advocates for data for life, and strives for all health data to be vendor-neutral and easily accessible. It puts organisations in control of their data, workflows, and transformation plans in order to improve patient care. Better has provided solutions to more than 150 clients across 16 countries, and Better Platform securely supports over 30 million patients.