6.5 Alison Tennant - Won’t someone think of the children?

The Aural Apothecary

It takes a special sort of person to work in paediatric care. We chat to Alison Tennant, Chief Pharmacist at Birmingham Women’s and Children’s NHS Trust about the risks and rewards of working with children and their medicines. Parents going home with bags of bottles, the difficulties of shared decision making and instead of DNA we have DNB - Did not Bring. A joyous and fascinating episode where we delve into the art and practice of prescribing in children.
In our micro discussion we discuss the excellent paper “Why learning how to swallow pills is good for patients, parents, and the planet” in which we learn about the importance of teaching children how to swallow tablets. Both as a lifeskill and as a measure to support sustainability. “If you can swallow Lego you can swallow a tablet!” https://www.bmj.com/content/384/bmj-2023-076257
Video: Kidzmedz Project: Teaching Children to Swallow Tablets: https://youtu.be/XwiuU-k2FIM?si=pXmEULvikHBA4Ftt
As with all of our guests, Alison shares with us a Memory Evoking Medicine, a career anthem and book that has influenced his life. Alison’s choice is as unique as you might expect!
Bonus Content! Pharmacogenomics in Children- Listen to Alison talk about her favourite subject regarding pharmacogenomics in mental health youngsters, and how it helps the shared decision making process in deciding which medicines to use https://www.theauralapothecary.com/p/bonus-material/
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