Award for improving Parkinson's care

Staff at Leeds Teaching Hospitals launched a city-wide project to reduce delays in patients receiving their medication on hospital wards.

People with the condition find themselves unable to move or swallow if they do not get their medication when they need it.

Jane Alty, a consultant neurologist specialising in Parkinson’s, and Alison Cracknell, patient safety champion and geriatrician, worked with the spouse of a Parkinson’s patient to create a system for avoiding medication delays. Their efforts were recognised with a prize at the UK Parkinson’s Excellence Network Awards.

Nurses, physiotherapists, speech and language therapists and pharmacists were involved in setting up the Quality Improvement Parkinson’s Collaborative.

Dr Alty said: “We felt that to get solutions that would truly work in practice, we needed to use the expertise of different people across the trust and not just the ward staff and clinicians specialising in Parkinson’s.

“It was amazing to see the breadth of people coming along – IT managers, porters, consultants, junior doctors, nurses, therapists, pharmacists, carers – all with ideas as to how they could help. It’s fantastic to be recognised with this award, and it’s really a testament to what can happen when hospital staff across all specialisms and teams work together for the benefit of patients.”

The project saw the introduction of beside posters and alarms to alert medical staff to the need for time-critical medication.

Early results showed that the average delay in a first dose of Parkinson’s medication after hospital admission reduced from more than seven hours to just over one hour. The number of missed Parkinson’s medications fell from 15 per cent to three per cent.

Dr Donald Grosset, of the Parkinson’s Excellence Network, said: “There are some truly remarkable services that are at the forefront of exceptional Parkinson’s care, and these awards are essential in highlighting and celebrating the achievements of the staff that run them.

He added: “I would like to congratulate the Leeds Quality Improvement Parkinson’s Collaborative on its well-deserved success.

“By sharing this creativity and innovation, the professionals behind this project are pushing up standards and encouraging others to continually push the boundaries of high quality care, creating better services for those affected by Parkinson’s across the UK.”

CONDITION AFFECTS ONE IN 500 IN UK

Parkinson’s disease is a progressive condition in which parts of the brain become increasingly damaged.

Around one in 500 people in the UK is affected by the illness, which is caused by the loss of nerve cells and leads to a reduction in dopamine being produced in the brain. Symptoms of Parkinson’s include involuntary shaking, slow physical movement and stiffness.

People with the condition also commonly experience depression, sleep problems and memory loss.