A new initiative encouraging patients to keep their medicines in distinctive green bags is set to improve medicines management and enhance patient safety at Heart of England NHS Foundation Trust.

Following a successful pilot, the green bags have been introduced at the Trust’s Heartlands, Solihull and Good Hope Hospital sites so that patients can bring their current medication with them to hospital and keep them together in one place.  They can be used if they are admitted to a ward and taken with them if they move wards, as well as when they are discharged from hospital.

Using the green bag means staff will be informed what medication patients are taking at any given time. In addition, providing there are no changes made to a patient’s medicine, hospital pharmacies may not need to supply more medicines, meaning that the hospital discharge process will be quicker for patients too.

Typical green bag items can include prescription and over the counter medicines such as tablets, creams, ointments, herbal remedies, inhalers, patches, eye drops and sprays.

Clinical director for pharmacy at Heart of England NHS Foundation Trust, Tania Carruthers, said: “Whether your visit is planned or an emergency, we would encourage patients to use the green bag provided to ensure your routine medicines and any that are introduced during your hospital stay, are kept with you throughout your hospital journey.

“It’s a simple scheme and by using the green bags, this will not only reduce the risks of missing or delaying medicine doses and result in enhanced quality of care and improved patient experience, it will also minimise medicine waste.”

Green bags will be given out at the Trust’s emergency departments, outpatients and admissions departments and by West Midlands Ambulance Service which will use them to collect medicines if patients need to go to hospital in an emergency.