Case study:
NHS South Yorkshire

Accumail: Sharing information between community pharmacies and GP practices

NHS South Yorkshire ICB worked with healthcare professionals in Rotherham to provide blood pressure (BP) checks to patients in community pharmacies and send over 5,452 BP readings to local GP practices.

 Sending BP data quickly via Accumail helped to save time, while significantly improving staff workflows and patient experiences across the region.

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Impact at a glance:

5,452 blood pressure readings shared

‘5 minutes’ saved every  time staff share a reading

62 community pharmacies  across the region benefitted

Every community pharmacy was doing something different. None of the data was coming directly into the clinical system. We needed a more efficient way of working.

Raz Saleem, Medicines Optimisation Team, NHS South Yorkshire ICB

Context: no clear system in place

The NHS commissioned a national case-finding service for hypertension in 2021. At the time, community pharmacies in Rotherham had no clear, consistent way of communicating with GPs.

Teams would provide BP readings over the phone, by letter, fax or ask patients to pass these on themselves. BP readings often weren’t received in a timely manner or were sent to inboxes that were incorrect, retired or not monitored. They also lacked any integration with GP clinical systems, causing unnecessary admin for GPs.

The ICB launched a promising Accumail pilot in Rotherham

In 2022, NHS South Yorkshire ICB supported five community pharmacies and GP practices in Rotherham to share BP readings within Accurx. Over 10 weeks, pharmacy staff trialed the system and shared feedback with the ICB’s Medicines Optimisation team.

Throughout, pharmacy staff reported that Accumail was ‘simple and easy to use’ and expressed newfound confidence that BP readings were getting quickly and securely to the right place.

Feedback was similarly strong among practice staff, who could receive and action BP readings all within their existing clinical system.

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Patients could rest assured that their information would get safely to their clinician. Using Accumail meant the patients’ blood pressure journey wasn’t impeded. We’ve had clinicians using it in general practice and community pharmacies – both loved it.

Raz Saleem, Medicines Optimisation Team, NHS South Yorkshire ICB

How NHS South Yorkshire ICB used Accumail

Pharmacists found patients in Accumail, using their patient number/DOB, attaching files and sending BP readings

Practice staff received all inbound messages into one shared inbox, and assigned messages to colleagues

Staff saved BP readings to patient records in one click, before seamlessly following up with the patient if need be

What was the impact?

Due to the pilot’s success, Accurx was offered to all 62 community pharmacies in Rotherham. These pharmacies agreed that Accumail was an efficient process for BP data to be shared. The pilot stopped data sharing from holding back the service. Patients could enjoy more reliable and timely care from both their community pharmacy and GP practice. The pilot let Rotherham GP practices see BP readings come through in Accumail and save these to the patient record, message the community pharmacy and patient all within one screen.