Patient involvement in medicines choice: improving policy and practice

This proposed knowledge exchange project involves the applicants working in partnership with the Medical Director, Director of Nursing and Chief Pharmacist at the Hammersmith Hospitals NHS Trust. The partners will bring together lessons from applied philosophy and healthcare practice to develop policy guidelines and supporting case study materials on the subject of patient involvement in medicines choice. These developments will be undertaken in consultation, and shared, with bioethics colleagues and national policy organisations, including the National Prescribing Centre, the Royal College of Physicians, the Picker Institute and the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry.

The project is based on two premises: first, that the gap between idealisations of patient involvement and what happens in practice reflects deficiencies in the idealisations as much as any 'professional deficits'; and second that better idealisations have the potential to contribute to better practice if they are based on realistic engagement with the demands of policy making and practice.

The principal applicant has undertaken work in philosophy of health and bioethics and both applicants have applied and developed this work in empirical research and policy-oriented publications. The Hammersmith Hospitals NHS Trust has a strong patient and public involvement strategy with well established implementation structures. The applicants and the professional leads at the Trust believe that the proposed knowledge exchange project will not only produce learning benefits for all project partners but will have significant policy impacts institutionally and nationally.