Support Use Of Medication In Social Care Settings

Law Regulations on the Use of Medication in Social Care Settings

The use of medication in social care settings is governed by several Acts. They mostly explain the way the medication should be used, prescribed, and apportioned. To such papers belongs The Medicine Act 1968, which is the ground for the permit, exchange, and produce of medicaments. It stated that all medicaments could only be provided by the pharmacists and be prescribed only by the qualified doctor. Special training and receiving a qualification can also give the opportunity to prescribe the medicines.

The Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 was created in order to regulate the use of unsafe drugs (for instance, produced from opium ones). It presented the strict instructions of how and when these potentially dangerous drugs can be used and have the aim to prevent the wrong using them.

In the Misuse of drugs 2001, regulated drugs are classified A, B, and C. The purpose of this act is to stop the use of drugs in nonmedical situations. It accentuates mostly on those, which causes the addiction. Many of the controlled ones are never used in medicine.

The Health Act 2006 presents stronger administration and checking measures for potentially dangerous drugs. It is basic legislation of the UK. It requires that all hospitals and healthcare organizations should have an Accountable Officer. The Act presents the duty of collaboration given to the responsible bodies and the rules of the inspections by the police.

The Misuse of Drugs Safe Custody Regulations 2007 contains the instructions for doing, keeping, and collecting the records of controlled drugs. The Health and Social Care Act, 2008 in England, includes the requirements for all the providers of the social care services. It protects people from the risk of receiving the wrong medicines. This is inspected by the Care Quality Commission.

Classification System of Medications

According to the Medicines Act 1968, all the medicines are classified into three main categories: prescriptions only medicines, over the counter and pharmacy medicines, and general sales list. Prescriptions only medicines can be sold if they prescribed by a doctor or other qualified specialist. To this group belong controlled drugs, antibiotics, antidepressants and medicines for the condition.

Pharmacy medicines the person can receive only from the pharmacist but without the prescriptions. Here belong such medicines as Loperamide, Aspirin, and others. General sales list includes the medicaments that are available in any shops. It consists of analgesics, antiseptics gels, creams, and cold remedies.

Reflecting and Incorporating Legislative Requirement by Policies

Any workplace has its policies and rules which should be obligatory based on the legislation. Every single healthcare establishment should have a medical policy. This policy includes the instructions on depository and ordering procedure, ways to solve the medicine error, underhanded medicine agreement, the medicines that don’t need prescriptions, regulations of creams. CQC should be presented in all policies.

According to the policies, every person that uses service should receive his medicines on time and safely. Additionally, one should be able to get the proper information about the medicaments. The provider is obligated to keep the medicaments in safety and protected.

The policies are created to regulate the work of the stuff so that they are supposed to be available at any time for any member of the staff.

Types of Medications

All the medicines are divided into groups: antibiotics (kill infection), analgesics (kill the pain), antihistamines (reduce allergy symptoms), antacids (reduce indigestions), anticoagulants (protect from blood clotting), psychotropic medicine (treat the depression), diuretics (release of fluids), laxatives (to fight with constipation), hormones, cytotoxic medicines (fight some states of the cancer).

In some cases, the medicines that are prescribed by doctors may lead to the unexpected results. There will specific changes in the patient condition such as difficulties with breathing, shaking, headaches and others. This important to distinguish whether these changes are the result of misuse of medicaments and to take proper actions.

Responsibilities in the Use of Medications in Social Care Settings

The person that prescribes the drugs is responsible for doing that in the closest interest of the patients. He should be aware of all the given instructions and the quality of the clinics. The person who prescribed the medicines should be acknowledged with the patient’s history of the disease. It is important to give enough piece of information for the patient and make sure that he understands all the instructions on how to use the medicaments. The doctor should be careful to prescribe the appropriate dosage.

The person who distributes medicines also has certain responsibilities. To present drugs for patients is the job of a qualified pharmacist. He is responsible for examining the prescriptions to be sure it is given by the qualified person and to avoid any mistakes. He is obliged to present the proper quantity of the drugs, to advise treatment, and to remind of the instructions of using.

The ill people may have professional support with the use of the drugs from the nurse, residential support worker, or a domiciliary one. All care works should be previously trained before they can help people take the medicines, spread creams, and use any drops. Additional training is required when there is a need for injections, rectal regulation, PEG feeding, and giving oxygen.

Techniques for Administering Medications

There are different ways of administrating the medicines. Most of all, the medicaments are used orally. They are tablets, capsules, liquids, and mixtures. Sublingually way requires that tablets and liquids are put under the tongue. Among them are tablets for angina. Inhalation administration is used for the patient with respiratory problems. Intramuscular injection is used for placing the medicine directly into the large muscles. Intravenous injection requires administrating directly into the veins. Subcutaneous injections are used for placing the medicament under the skin. Among others, there are installation administration (to use via nose or eyes), rectal, vaginal, topical application, and transdermal patch administration.

There are different forms of the keeping the medicine such as tablets, capsules, gels, creams, liquids, injections, drops, sprays, inhalers, implants, pessaries, and patches. Different forms were produced to make the possible effect in every case.

There exist a great number of medical devices that help people take and dosage medicaments. Among them, there are compliance aids, monitored dosage system, inhalers and PEG tube administration.

Different Actions Which are Required for the Medicines

It is important to know how to receive and keep the medicaments if the patient doesn’t want to damage them. The home medicines should be kept in a closed cupboard that is safe enough. There are specific requirements relating to the temperature. For most medicaments, it is forbidden to be kept under the temperature higher than 25 degrees of Calcium. There should an appropriate humidity condition for keeping the drugs. After the patient’s death, the medicaments should be presented for at least seven days to help the coroner state all the information.

If there are some medicines that aren’t used anymore, there are strict instructions how to get rid of them properly. There can be several purposes for useless drugs such as ending of the term of use, the death of the patient or changing the treatments.  If the medicament hasn’t reached the ending date, it may be collected to the pharmacy.

Individual Rights When Managing Medications

The use of medications has four important principles: consent, privacy, self-medication or active participation, and confidentiality.

The principle of consent requires the ability of the patient to refuse to take the prescribed medicines. This case is appropriate when the person isn’t given the full information on the use of the drugs. The principle of self-medication or active participation allows the patient to choose whether they want to be placed under the constant control of the professionals or stay at home and take there their medicines.

The principle of privacy remains that the patient has his medicaments and don’t need them with others and receive the help when there is a real need. The last one is the principle of confidentiality which provides the keeping in private the patient’s illness history and prescribed medicaments.