14 November 2009
The campaign, held under the banner ‘Be Safe — Ask Your Pharmacist’, will focus on the importance of promoting medication safety at all levels and among healthcare professionals who prescribe the medicines and the public who use them. This is a follow up on the success of the first campaign in 2006 which helped set the standards in public medication safety education.
The campaign will initially target healthcare professionals at all SEHA facilities, followed by a public campaign to include the nationals and expatriates living in Abu Dhabi, Al Ain and the Western Region.
Dr Ali Alobaidli, chief medical officer of SEHA, elaborated on the company’s strategic objective to deliver better healthcare at all levels and excel in patient safety across all its facilities.
“SEHA realises the challenges the healthcare is facing globally in regard to patient safety,” Dr Alobaidli said, adding that educating healthcare professionals in safe practices is vital, and is one of the continuing initiatives of the company.
“Our aim is to equip health professionals with the knowledge to avoid medication errors and the courage to report these errors immediately. We hope these measures will highlight the dangerous ramifications of errors and negligence on the patient, and increase awareness on the importance of studied and responsible prescription procedures.”
Dr Sahar Abu Omar, chairperson of the Medication Safety Committee at SEHA, noted the importance of the public engaging themselves in their treatment and learning more about the medications they take and how to take them safely.
Through the campaign, SEHA hopes to educate people on the fundamentals of medication usage and give them an opportunity to clarify doubts. The campaign will focus on key messages relating to responsibility of the patient, proper storage habits for medicines and how to administer children’s medication.
“This is a highly interactive campaign. We will be setting up information kiosks at key hospitals and malls and we will encourage people to bring medications to our pharmacists to discuss any questions or issues they may have. This is a great opportunity for the public to engage with highly qualified SEHA pharmacists,” said Dr Abu Omar.
