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NHS England

iQAAPS: Quality Assurance of Aseptic Preparation Services

NHS Commissioning

The Specialist Pharmacy Service (SPS) supports medicines optimisation across the NHS.

 

Based in a number of NHS Trusts and Clinical Commissioning Groups / ICS across the country, SPS are a close-knit group of highly experienced pharmacists, pharmacy technicians and support staff.

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The NHS Pharmaceutical Aseptic Services Group acts as an expert and informed body on NHS pharmacy-based aseptic preparation.

 

Offering guidance on best practice they develop standards and carry out auditing services for those units who prepare and manufacture medicines.

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In partnership with Quiqsolutions iQAAPs has been developed as a key tool in the auditing of these critical services.

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In the autumn of 2021 Quiqsolutions was commissioned by the NHS Specialist Pharmacy Service to provide a digital tool for managing the auditing of Aseptic Pharmacy Services within Trusts and Health Boards across the United Kingdom.

 

As a result the iQAAPS tool was developed involving the technical team at Quiqsolutions and key stakeholders involved in auditing aseptic pharmacy units. ​​

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Resources

iQAAPs Video Guides

After a successful pilot involving multiple trusts and health boards across England and Wales, iQAAPs is being rolled out across the UK to trusts and health boards

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Speechmark

iQAAPS is an electronic audit tool developed in partnership with Specialist Pharmacy Service to support external audits of NHS Pharmacy Aseptic Units (unlicensed).

iQAAPS incorporates the Quality Assurance of Aseptic Preparation Services 5th Edition standards by kind permission of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society and NHS Pharmaceutical QA Committee.

Features

  • Pre-Audit Questionnaires: Completion by units / review by auditors

  • Audits: Full audit recording and RAG rating against all QAAPS standards by regional auditors

  • Action Plans: Automatic action plan requests for units against Auditor rating, SMART action plan creation, alerts and notifications

  • Evidence: Evidence statements, document attachments, RAG rating, Summary reports, alerts and notifications

  • Document Management: Key assurance documents, policies and reports 

  • KPI Data: Monthly KPI reporting, site / regional level dashboards

  • Reporting: Real-time and trend analysis over time for all Audit and Evidence reports

  • Training & Support: Help videos and on-going helpdesk support

Benefits

  • Real-time visibility of compliance for units, trusts and all NHS Regions

  • Highlights strengths and weaknesses and drives continuous quality improvement

  • Enables performance comparisons within regions or nationally

  • Reduces administration time by up to 30%

  • Supports drive for consistency across aseptic units

  • Self-assessment by units for ongoing improvement outside of audit schedule

  • Enhanced reporting with enhanced availability of data supporting future decision-making 

  • Low-cost and rapid implementation and roll-out

  • Intuitive and user-friendly compared with spreadsheet version

  • Scalability – expandable to include additional quality standards or other areas of Trust compliance

  • Secure and available – supported by world-class hosting arrangements 

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