Clinical Pharmacist calls for papers on long-term conditions

Clinical Pharmacist today invites article submissions to showcase current and best practice on long-term conditions (LTCs) to support the Royal Pharmaceutical Society campaign focusing on the role pharmacists can play in the care of patients with these common, and often life-long conditions.

Article types considered include research, reviews, perspectives, insight, CPD and short communications (for more information see our author guidelines).

Over 15 million people in England are currently living with a LTC according to the Department of Health and caring for patients with LTCs currently accounts for around 70% of the health and social care budget in England. Estimates from the 2014 Health Select Committee report
‘Managing the care of people with LTCs’
  indicate that this burden of patients with one or more LTCs will likely rise to around 18 million by 2025.

In Wales, the demand on the NHS by patients with LTCs is projected to be around 32% (an additional 181,000 patients) between 2010 and 2026. However in Scotland, over 40% of the population have at least one LTC, and one in four adults over the age of 16 report some form of long-term illness, health problem or disability.

A LTC can be defined as condition that currently cannot be cured, but can be controlled by medication and other therapies, with examples including diabetes, asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and heart disease. Many patients with LTCs also experience co- or multi-morbidities.

The effective management of LTCs is widely recognised to be one of the significant challenges currently facing the NHS, with £15 billion being spent on medicines for their management in 2015/16. As the experts in medicines, pharmacists already play an important role by monitoring, supporting and treating patients living with LTCs and can also ensure people get the best outcomes from their medicines.

Articles and ideas for potential articles should be submitted by email to submitcp@rpharms.com, clearly stating that the submission is in response to this call. All articles must be received by 12^th July 2017.

It is envisaged that articles submitted in response to this call and accepted for publication will be published under a ‘Special Report’ on www.pharmaceutical-journal.com.

Michael Dowdall – Senior Editor, Research & Learning

Clinical Pharmacist