Pharmaceutical companies, the government, primary care trusts (PCTs) and GP consortia need to pull together to tackle the “tsunami” of long-term conditions that the UK health service is facing, the PM Society annual lecture heard.
Sir John Oldham, the Department of Health’s national clinical lead for quality and productivity, told guests: “If we continue to manage people with long-term conditions as we do now the NHS is not sustainable. It’s not about politics, it’s about mathematics.
“We have to make a change. There are ways to treat people with multiple conditions to reduce hospital stays. The pharma industry can help by transferring knowledge to patients so they can co-manage their conditions. We need to shift from a bio-medical model to a social model,” he added.
Meanwhile Leslie Galloway, chairman of the Ethical Medicines Industry Group, discussed value based pricing. “Many see it as a threat, but it is not designed to increase prices. We need constant pricing across the UK,” he told the guests.