PHOENIx after overdose
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Pharmacy Homeless Outreach Engagement Non medical Independent prescribing Rx (PHOENIx) after overdose: pilot randomised controlled trial
IRAS ID
286329
Contact name
Richard Lowrie
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde
ISRCTN Number
ISRCTN39053000
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 6 months, days
Research summary
The number of people experiencing homelessness is increasing. Their health is worsening, characterised by multiple and complex needs. Emergency department(ED) presentations and hospital admissions for non-fatal drug overdoses are increasing. After overdosing, the onus is usually on highly vulnerable, alienated, unwell patients to present to health and social care staff in buildings dispersed across Glasgow to ask for help. Addictions services are remote form GP services. Management of complex health and social problems lacks co-ordination requiring different visits, at different times with services keeping separate records. Navigating and visiting different services, without readily available phones or information technology, is burdensome. It contributes to poor health outcomes. We have found that trust is important to how our services are used and trust increases when we go to patients who are homeless, rather than waiting for patients to present. We are a team of NHS Pharmacists and Simon Community Scotland (SCS) workers. We run an assertive outreach service (PHOENIx) to assess, treat, prescribe, and refer patients who are homeless to relevant services. We need better evidence to see if PHOENIx helps and the first stage of building better evidence is to run a randomised controlled trial in miniature (a pilot).
So after gaining consent, we plan to collect baseline information and randomly assign patients into an active group (in addition to accessing care as normal, patients will be visited by PHOENIx team weekly for up to 9 months, receiving health and social care assessment and intervention) or Usual care group (care as normal). If the results of our pilot study are promising, and patients tell us pharmacist visits help them, we plan to run a much bigger study to test if pharmacist visits reduce overdoses and ED attendances.
REC name
South East Scotland REC 01
REC reference
21/SS/0004
Date of REC Opinion
17 Feb 2021
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion