Winner

 

There are 8 million deaf and hard of hearing people in the UK. 50,000 of them use British Sign Language. As a minority group for whom English is a second language, the Deaf community faces comparable problems to ethnic minority groups in accessing information. Joan Hartley organised a series of medicines information sessions presented in British Sign Language focusing on ‘Medicines and the Deaf Community’. A 20-minute presentation on medicines is given, followed by a question and answer session with a sign language interpreter translating the session into BSL. A practising community pharmacist is present to answer the questions, assisted by the interpreter. The project reached 155 deaf and hard of hearing people in Cambridgeshire and East Anglia giving them the opportunity to learn how to dispose of out of date medicines, the need to take medicines at the correct time of day and the wider services that pharmacists provide.

 

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The NIHR Medicines for Children Research Network is part of the National Institute for Health Research and was created to improve the co-ordination, speed and quality of randomised controlled trials and studies of medicines for children and adolescents. Putting children and young people at the heart of the agenda is crucial for the group. To achieve this, the MCRN established a Children and Young Persons Advisory Group to help the network to develop a model to encourage children and young people to ask questions about medicines. The group meets six times a year, and has provided input into the development of a MCRN website, helped to assess patient information leaflets for children and young people, and provided crucial input into the design of guidance notes on involving young people in clinical research.