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Profile
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9/12/2011
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Innovating to improve health
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Jignesh Patel is at the heart of his community.
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Jignesh Patel's desire to immerse himself in the thick of community healthcare has given Plaistow's immigrant population renewed optimism. Neil Trainis talks to the Pharmacy Business Innovation Award winner...
For every pharmacist flailing around in panic or frozen numb with anxiety at the thought of pharmacy changing beyond all recognition, there is a leading light capable of shining a path through the fog of doubt.
At least, that is the theory as put forward by those quick to defend and promote community pharmacy as unprecedented health reforms bite. Jignesh Patel seems like the prototype for how the modern pharmacist should function, although a sturdy conviction to go that extra mile is not accompanied by conceit. “The main reason I got into pharmacy was family influence. My brother was a pharmacist before me. I was looking at a career in dentistry or pharmacy but dentistry was harder to get into at the time. I didn't have the confidence to get the grades,” the Pharmacy Business Innovation Award winner reminisces with a self effacing modesty that is out of kilter with his impressive accomplishments. “My career choice was based on my perspective. Pharmacy is a career. It was a business-based decision at that time but I enjoy it.”
There is, according to Jignesh, “a pharmacy within two minutes' walking distance in every direction” of Rohpharm but any anxiety over competition melts away. “We've worked very hard to beat off that competition,” he says. “In terms of our business, it's a service-based pharmacy rather than a retail, high prescription volume pharmacy.”
A fearlessness tempers his psyche, fuelling his desire to attempt new innovations to help people with their health. Just three months after qualifying as a pharmacist as a wide-eyed 22-year-old, he bought Rohpharm Chemist. “I did it without any additional clinical experience or retail skills,” he says. “Everything I've learnt, I've learnt from day one.” Embedded in multi-cultural Plaistow, forming a part of Newham, one of the most deprived boroughs in the UK, Rohpharm is very much part of the fabric of its largely immigrant community.
There is optimism that the Olympic Games in nearby Stratford next year will lavish the run-down area with prosperity and jobs. Jignesh has made strides in furnishing people with hope where at one time they may have thought there was none. For every 148 people in Newham, he suggests, one has HIV. Or, as Pharmacy Business's roving judge Richard King bluntly put it, “the highest incidence of HIV per head of population in the capital.”
Fighting to stop the spread of the virus, as well as counselling those affected, offers a considerable challenge. It is a stern test but one Jignesh relishes. “We have people who come to us from the surrounding areas, Forest Gate, Manor Park, a real population mix and large Afro-Caribbean population,” he says. “These are people who travel back to their own country, have sexual contact at home, have not been screened, come back and start a new relationship here. They bring the infection with them and spread the virus.” Halting the spread of the virus might have been an uphill struggle, not to mention unheard of, for the pharmacist of 10 years ago yet Jignesh's determination and sense of creativity has no boundaries. Last year he embarked on a pilot scheme with three other pharmacies to offer a free HIV testing service. “It took off,” he asserts. “We had a struggle in October but come November and December, we were doing 100 screens a month. If you do 300, 400 you might find one positive. We found seven.”
Inspired
The scheme is part-funded by the local council and having been inspired by the success of his collaborative initiative, Jignesh wants to involve more pharmacists in HIV detection. He knows, however, that the economic climate prevent such schemes being implemented in all areas. “In July we did the final evaluation of the project and we had a lot of support from the Health Protection Agency but we're keen to get pharmacists involved more,” he says. “We do Chlamydia screening but HIV occurs more in inner-city areas like Birmingham and Manchester. You have to look at the cost-effectiveness of the programme. PCTs will only do it where there's a health benefit.”
Nothing has deterred him from expanding a project designed to create awareness and save lives. A significant part of the modern pharmacist's remit is to prevent illness as well as treat it. Jignesh has forged links with community groups to cultivate a process of education which it is hoped will stop the propagation of the virus and improve awareness of good health in all regards. “We work with other GPs but we also work with and educate groups such as African community groups and church groups. These groups can get to the heart of their community,” he says. “I actively work to educate people about medicines management, sexual health and diet and exercise and we work well with voluntary organisations so they can give the correct message to people. We won't share information with other organisations. Our aim is to educate and train. Since October, it's gone brilliantly. Diseases can be tackled in all areas, sexual health, heart disease and so on. We try and help voluntary groups to help people in the community.”
Educating voluntary community groups as part of the wider goal of illness prevention provides Jignesh with great satisfaction. It makes him feel much more than a pharmacist. It makes him feel like a clinician, a rounded healthcare professional.
Difference
Shunning bureaucracy and almost repulsed by pharmacy's mechanical machinations, he is most at ease actively making a difference to people's lives, getting stuck into the nitty-gritty of healthcare in the community. In 2005 he relinquished a position on North East London LPC because “it became a political organisation, arguing about issues which were not important to pharmacists.”
Seeking out inventive and inexpensive ways to ameliorate the health of people in Plaistow has led him to play a part, alongside the area's Public Health Team, in creating monthly training events which are attended by 30 to 40 people from the voluntary groups. “We train them up. We're the hub and we create satellites of information. We have different presentations. Cardiology, diabetes, sexual health. There's a three-day training programme and those who take part sit an exam at the end,” he says. “We have an 80% pass rate and those who pass are given a certificate saying they are a health advocate. It makes them feel good.”
Jignesh revels in that hands-on approach to healthcare. “I enjoy this sort of thing. My perception of pharmacy over the last 10 years has changed. I now feel I'm part of the community,” he suggests. “You look at Boots, they provide detailed services and products but they don't engage like clinicians. We need to get engaged, we need to be patient-focused, patient-led which was what the (Health) White Paper said. If you don't, you're going to be left out as an outsider.
“Pharmacists need to talk to social services and find out what they want. Don't wait for it to come to you. Pharmacists must understand what preventative health and patient-focused services are all about. Pharmacists have to be local satellites, supporting GPs with information. They must be clinical. They must be specialists.” Not that everybody has an intimate appreciation of pharmacy's workings. “It's surprising. We've had high profile people saying pharmacists are very friendly and efficient but they don't actually know what pharmacists do,” he says, his voice tinged with subtle irritation. “If local leaders don't know what we do, how can Joe Public know?”
He is concerned that pharmacy is not being promoted strongly enough from within the profession itself, describing Pharmacy Voice as “a good idea” but suggesting that the body “is driven by the CCA who represent the multiples” as opposed to independent pharmacists. “My concern is whether they will actually support us,” he ponders. He is a bigger fan of the recently relaunched Independent Pharmacy Federation. “Fin (McCaul, the IPF chairman) and his team are very good. Things I do are bypassed through to him. Fin is good at that; getting into the right circles and making things happen. You need ministers to hear your voice. Having key contacts who can speak to MPs is really important. We need political support otherwise you won't get anywhere.”
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