NHS cancer check has set a new record, despite pressures on hospitals due to Covid-19, the number of people being treated for the cancer remained higher than
before the pandemic, revealed NHS.
Over the last 12 months almost three million people were referred for cancer checks which is up by over a tenth on the 2.4 million people referred before the
pandemic.
"Even at the peak of the Omicron wave, referrals for suspected cancer were at 116 per cent of pre-pandemic levels with around 11,000 people getting checked every
day over the last year," said NHS.
In order to meet increasing demand for cancer checks, NHS services across the country are expanding their diagnostic capabilities through one stop shops for tests,
mobile clinics and cancer symptom hotlines, ensuring people are diagnosed and treated as early as possible to give them a much better chance of beating the disease.
More than 30,000 people every month are being invited for lung cancer checks through NHS mobile trucks visiting at risk communities across the country, as part of
the biggest programme to improve early lung cancer diagnosis in health service history.
AAH Pharmaceuticals on Tuesday (November 15) announced the promotion of its commercial director David Bound to chief executive officer of the company.
In his 10 years in the company, Mr Bound has helped to drive growth across the AAH business, implementing new digital channels for customers, and developing
strategic partnerships with pharmaceutical manufacturers - drawing on from his vast experience in the healthcare industry, as well as in supply chain, operations,
and trading.
Commenting on his promotion, he said: "I'm delighted to be taking on this role at such a critical time for healthcare. There are many challenges affecting the
industry right now - from inflationary pressures to workforce issues - and I'm looking forward to tackling them head-on alongside my excellent team."
Switzerland is experiencing medicine shortages due to supply chain issues linked to COVID lockdowns in China and war in Europe, the country's pharmacists
association said.
"We have the biggest problems with children's medications, especially fever-reducing syrup," Enea Martinelli from pharmaSuisse told Swiss broadcaster SRF.
"There are also shortages of blood pressure medications, psychiatric medications and Parkinson's medications," he said.
The Pharmacists Defence Association (PDA) has expressed its keenness to work with the NHS nationally and at the ICB level to discuss how the pharmacist
workforce can most effectively be part of the multidisciplinary team, after the publication of Long-awaited NHS England workforce plan.
Welcoming its publication Alison Jones, PDA Director of Policy said: "It gives greater clarity around the future direction and strategy for professional development,
training, and opportunities for those currently working in the health service or considering their future career. There is a strong emphasis on further development
of the clinical role of pharmacists to support better patient care.
"However, this is a plan that will take years, indeed decades to come to fruition and its success will need to be underpinned by significant funding for its entire
life course.
Workplace pressures, reductions in support staff, and a lack of protected learning time are matters of immediate concern for many PDA members, issues which are
regularly highlighted through activities, such as the safer pharmacies survey.
The Pharmacists' Defence Association raised concerns over the practice of firing and rehiring employees, which often leads to denial of individuals' rights to redundancy, forcing them to face cuts to their terms and conditions.
It noted that some employers may use the 'fire and rehire' practice to force staff to accept lower wages, different hours, or other changes in working conditions.
It cited an example of a lawsuit in which Tesco lost a High Court battle when Usdaw won a case to protect workers from unfair tactics.
The PDA said although the trade union won the case, the practice of firing and rehiring can still be legal in some circumstances. However, it believes the practice is both immoral and unethical.
Change is sweeping through Westminster as the newly elected Labour government makes strategic cabinet appointments following their landslide victory in the
general election held on Thursday, July 4.
With Sir Keir Starmer stepping in as the new Prime Minister and Wes Streeting assuming the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care role, the announcement of
Karin Smyth and Stephen Kinnock as health ministers on Monday marked a pivotal moment in Labour's healthcare agenda.
Who is the new Minister of State for Health?
Karin Smyth, the Labour MP for Bristol South, has been appointed as Minister of State for Health.
Smyth has a robust background in healthcare, having served as a shadow spokesperson on health since December 2021.
Her previous roles include Shadow Minister for Northern Ireland and Shadow Deputy Leader of the House of Commons.
Before her parliamentary career, Smyth worked as an NHS Manager and held a non-executive director position at an NHS Trust.
Hobbs, who joined the company in 2019, navigated it through the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, and successfully oversaw the acquisition and integration
of Lexon in 2023. He will retire from the company at the end of September 2024.
"After five years with the company, I am retiring at the end of September to spend time with my wife who was diagnosed with motor neurone disease last year," Hobbs
said.
"I wish to extend my personal thanks to our owners, the Bestway Group, for their kindness and understanding of our situation.
"It has been a privilege to lead the Well Pharmacy, now Bestway Healthcare organisation. The business is resilient for today and fit to prosper in the long term.
When I leave it will be with gratitude and admiration for the 7,500+ people in Bestway Healthcare who are committed to improving the lives of our patients and
customers, thank you all."
Bambuterol 10mg tablet, used in the treatment of asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, is facing supply disruption as sole supplier of the medicine, Astra Zeneca, is discontinuing its production, according to an update by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC).
The available stock of the medicine is expected to be exhausted by the end of June 2022.
Meanwhile, other oral β2-agonists, which are the preferred route of administration, remain available, DHSC said.
The Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) has cautioned that measures to protect people against Covid-19 must be stepped up in the wake of discovery of the new variant, B.1.1.529.
It has urged members of the public to practice 'hands, face, space and ventilation' protection measures which have become less used in the last few months.
RPS director of pharmacy Robbie Turner said that though it was too early to conclude about the transmissibility or resistance of the new variant to current vaccines, quick action should be taken to protect the public.
"Each one of us must take the necessary precautions of wearing a mask in higher risk situations, maintaining social distancing wherever possible, ensuring there's appropriate ventilation indoors when meeting others and washing our hands regularly."
Encouraging people to take Covid vaccine, he said, it "is still our best defence against this virus".
Clinical trials for BioNTech's cancer vaccines should start this year in Britain, marking an important step towards their possible sale on the open market,
the German company's top executive Ugur Sahin told magazine Der Spiegel.
BioNTech, known for its COVID vaccine with U.S. partner Pfizer, is currently deciding which types of cancer it wants to test its personalized cancer immunotherapies
on and the locations where it will conduct the trials, Sahin said.
The company wants these therapies, which are based on messenger RNA (mRNA) technology similar to the one that underpins its COVID-19 vaccine, to soon become a regular
treatment for cancer patients.
"We believe that this should be possible for large amounts of patients before 2030," Sahin said.
Baby teeth could one day lead to the development of a much-needed tool for identifying children who are at risk for psychological problems, a study by the
University of Bristol has concluded.
The research has been published in the 'JAMA Network Open' - a monthly journal published by the American Medical Association.
The origin of this study traces back several years, when senior author Erin Dunn - a social and psychiatric epidemiologist and an investigator in MGH's Psychiatric and Neurodevelopmental Genetics Unit - learned about work in the field of anthropology that could help solve a longstanding problem in her own research.
She studies the effects of childhood adversity, which research suggested, is responsible for up to one-third of all mental health disorders.
Dunn is particularly interested in the timing of these adverse events and in uncovering whether there are sensitive periods during child development when exposure to adversity is particularly harmful.
While thanking the provisionally registered pharmacists and their employers for supporting NHS services during the pandemic, the General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC) has asked the 63 eligible candidates to join the main register by January 31 to continue practicing.
A total number of 4,799 provisionally-registered pharmacists have been on the provisional register since it was introduced in July 2020 in response to the Covid-19
pandemic, which had affected the registration assessment schedule.
As of Tuesday (January 18), 237 were still on the provisional register, of which 84 have begun the process to join the main register, 90 did not sat an assessment, while 63 eligible candidates are yet to start their application.
The register enabled trainees who had completed their training to support NHS services and provide patient care effectively as provisionally-registered pharmacists,
while they waited to sit the registration assessment.
After providing three potential opportunities to trainees to sit the registration assessment - in March, July and November 2021, the provisional register will close
on January 31, 2022.
Prime minister Boris Johnson announced on Wednesday (January 19) that restrictions re-imposed in England last month would be lifted by from next Thursday (January 27).
In the latest development, the government has decided to end the guidance on working from home, asking employers to make adequate arrangements to return safely to work.
From the start of next Thursday, mandatory certification based on vaccines and tests will end, however, organisations can still choose to use the NHS Covid Pass voluntarily.
Besides, the legal mandate to wear face masks will go away from next week.
Making a statement to the House of Commons on Covid-19, he said that infection levels are falling in England mainly because of the country's "extraordinary booster campaign".
He noted more than 36 million Covid-19 booster jabs had been delivered, with over 90 percent of over-60s now given a third dose.
"Our scientists believe it is likely that the Omicron wave has now peaked nationally," Johnson added, while cautioning "the pandemic is not over".
"I encourage everyone across the country to continue with all the cautious behaviours that we know help to keep each everybody safe."
The UK Health Security Agency on Friday said it had designated a sub-lineage of the dominant and highly transmissible Omicron coronavirus variant as a variant under investigation.
BA.2, which does not have the specific mutation seen with Omicron that can be used as a proxy to easily distinguish it from Delta, is being investigated but has not been designated a variant of concern.
"It is the nature of viruses to evolve and mutate, so it's to be expected that we will continue to see new variants emerge," Dr Meera Chand, incident director at the UKHSA, said.
"Our continued genomic surveillance allows us to detect them and assess whether they are significant."
Britain had identified 53 sequences of the BA.2 sub-lineage as of January 10, with updated figures due to be published later on Friday.
Pharmanovia, the lifecycle management company has signed a licence and supply agreement with Aquestive Therapeutics for its patented diazepam buccal film
formulation across the EU, UK, Switzerland, and Norway, as well as countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA)- up to 48 markets in total.
Aquestive Therapeutics has been granted tentative approval by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), for its diazepam buccal film for the acute treatment of
intermittent, stereotypic episodes of frequent seizure activity (i.e., seizure clusters, acute repetitive seizures) that are distinct from a patient's usual
seizure pattern in patients with epilepsy 12 years of age and older.
Pharmanovia will be responsible for seeking appropriate regulatory approval across EU and MENA.
Pharmanovia CEO, James Burt commented: "Pharmanovia and Aquestive are aligned in our mission to find new and innovative ways to enhance and revitalise iconic
medicines. We have extensive experience with diazepam through the Valium brand and, together with Aquestive's unique PharmFilm technology, we're intending to bring
a novel alternative diazepam delivery option to caregivers and patients at a time of critical need."
In a long scripted overhaul of its business, GlaxoSmithKline spun off its consumer health business on Monday (July 18) in the biggest listing in Europe for
more than a decade.
The new company, Haleon, becomes the world's biggest standalone consumer health business, home to brands including Sensodyne toothpaste, pain relief drug Panadol
and cold treatment Theraflu.
Shares in Haleon started trading at 330 pence on Monday morning, giving the business a market valuation of around £30.5 billion - dashing high hopes for Haleon's
much higher market valuation after GSK in January said it had rebuffed a £50 billion offer from Unilever on the basis it was too low.
The major strategy shift by GSK chief executive Emma Walmsley to focus on the company's core pharmaceuticals business comes after she faced intense activist
shareholder pressure over its delays in producing Covid jabs and treatments.
An oral drug combination by Novartis showed promise in treating a subgroup of patients suffering from a common childhood brain cancer in a trial.
In the mid-stage trial, 47 per cent of the patients that were given the two drugs Tafinlar and Mekinist saw their tumours shrink, far above a rate of 11 per cent
in a comparative group of participants on standard chemotherapy, the drugmaker said on Monday, June 6.
The participants, aged one to 17 years, were suffering from low-grade gliomas (LGG), the most common childhood brain cancer.
The trial only included those who were found to have a mutation known as BRAF V600, a genetic contributor in about 15 per cent to 20 per cent of paediatric LGG cases.
Among further results of the trial with 110 participants, the median time without disease progression was 20.1 months for those given the Novartis drug combo,
compared to 7.4 months on chemotherapy.
The new oral treatment candidate also caused less severe side effects than burdensome chemotherapy.
The International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP) has released a handbook today (February 23) on guidance for pharmacists on supporting self-care.
The handbook, "Empowering self-care: A handbook for pharmacists", covers six areas of self-care - sore throat, gastrointestinal complaints, musculoskeletal pain, fever in children, sexual health and disinfection.
Commenting on the release, Rúben Viegas, co-author of the handbook, said: Community pharmacists already help people in self-care by giving advice on non-prescription
medicines, nutrition, physical activity and lifestyle choices, but this new resource from FIP offers added support for these professional services that demonstrate our profession's commitment to primary health care."
The publication, also intended as an advocacy resource for FIP's member organisations, discusses latest trends and strategies in self-care and explores innovations adopted across several practice areas.
It aims to provide pharmacists with concise guidance on coaching practices and person-centred approaches to promote self-care.
In a significant development, the British Medical Association's (BMA) consultants committee has voted to accept the government's offer on pay for senior
doctors in England, along with proposed reforms to the Review Body on Doctors' and Dentists' Remuneration (DDRB).
This decision follows a prolonged dispute between consultants and the government, which spanned over a year, involving unprecedented industrial actions.
Committee Chair Vishal Sharma described the agreement as "the end of the beginning" in consultants' endeavors to restore their pay levels to those of 2008.
Stressing the importance of the review body's independence in averting future pay disputes, Sharma emphasized the imperative role of utilizing this autonomy
effectively.
A staggering 83% of consultants participating in the three-week referendum voted in favor of accepting the offer, signaling a widespread endorsement of the
agreement within the profession.
"Our main concerns are that the use of what they call an asynchronous supply, where the prescriber neither sees nor talks to the patient at the time they
issue the prescription, does lay itself open to perhaps people getting hold of medication that they shouldn't," the Head of Policy, PDA said.
The Pharmacists' Defence Association (PDA) engages in a critical conversation on BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour, shedding light on the online prescribing of weight
loss drugs and advocating for safer practices.
The PDA's spokesperson, Head of Policy Alima Batchelor, emphasised the importance of adhering to professional guidelines to ensure patient safety and mitigate
regulatory concerns.
During the feature, the PDA highlighted the complexities and risks associated with online supply chains, stressing the necessity for direct clinical consultations
and pharmacist involvement in medication management.
""There are guidelines and advice about verification within the DiCE guidance, but it doesn't go quite far enough for us. We are concerned when patients decline
to allow the online prescriber to advise their GP of what they're taking," Batchelor highlighted.