NOTE: As of 31 March 2021, the Medicine Use Review service has been discontinued throughout the country.
What is a Medicine Use Review?
Accredited pharmacies deliver across the UK deliver the Medicine Use Review (MUR) service. It involves a private patient-pharmacist consultation with the express purpose of improving the patient’s overall knowledge of the medicine they are taking. This is useful if you typically take several prescription medicines at once or have a long-term illness requiring constant medicine changes.
What does the consultation involve?
The consultation involves:
- helping patients to fully understand why they are taking the medicine through a series of questions.
- establishing the correct way to take your medicine.
- providing support for patients struggling with their medication and helping them to get back on track.
- a discussion of what side-effects may occur from the medication, the health risks that may affect the patient if treatment isn’t taken seriously.
Medicine use reviews are tailored to the patient’s needs and should prove useful in taking your medication less of a daunting task.
Why are medicine use reviews important?
Effective and safe use of prescribed medication should always a priority for the patient, the prescriber and the pharmacist. As people age, the likelihood of becoming ill and being treated for a number of conditions increases. This inevitably leads to the prescribing of multiple forms of medication which can be confusing.
If you take a ‘high-risk medicine’, then you may be referred for a medicine use review so that you fully understand the risks of the medication and are taking the medication effectively. With more and more of the population ageing, medicine use reviews are becoming more popular and important.
This 1 to 1 service will help you find out more about your medicine, identify any problems you may be having with taking your medicine prescribed, and help you to take your medicine to the best effect.