Reducing The Stigma in Mental Health – An Evaluation of a Joint Acute and Mental Health Trust Shared Learning Programme Anthony Young1 Lead Pharmacist - Workforce Development and Research Anthony.young@ntw.nhs.uk , Kate Smith2 Senior Clinical Pharmacist – Staff Development , Claire Thomas1 Deputy Chief Pharmacist, Richard Copeland2 Head of Clinical Services/Deputy Chief Pharmacist Pharmacy Department, Northumberland Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trust Pharmacy Department, Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust Background Patients with serious mental illness die up to 20 years earlier than those without. In many cases this is preventable. Improving the knowledge of pharmacists involved in both mental and physical health sectors is one of the ways that this could be supported1. When patients with mental health problems are admitted to a general or acute hospital it is often their physical health issues that are prioritised. Whilst this is often clinically appropriate, the confidence amongst the clinical pharmacy team around mental health and its impact on physical health is sometimes low. There is the opposite issue in mental health specialist pharmacists. There are many strategies that have called for this key issue to be addressed in narrowing of the gap in terms of the physical health of patients with mental illness2,3. It was decided to run a series of events to bring the two sectors together to look at how mental health and physical health within medicines optimisation could be improved. We believe that shared learning across organisational boundaries is a novel way of learning and one that improves professional networks as well as competence. Objective To analyse the success and usefulness of the shared learning events and whether it would change practice going forward to improve patient care.  Method An informal evening session Learning through facilitated case studies Co-led by acute and mental health pharmacists Mental and physical health needs were reviewed Survey Monkey was circulated after each event to capture the views of participants 60 members of the pharmacy teams attended including GP and secondary care pharmacists Examples of Facilitated Cases Used Dementia and the use of antipsychotics in delirium Lithium and acute kidney injury Clozapine in a patient with cardiovascular risks Results Discussion and Conclusion 100% of feedback of those involved in the events found them extremely beneficial We believe patient care has improved as a result Increased professional networks Improved communication between the acute and mental health trust Next Steps… Further events have been organised Acute trusts in our other localities of our Trust are now collaborating with NTW to have similar events The links that have been formed have led to further workforce discussion such as shared posts between sectors References https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Mental-Health-Taskforce-FYFV-final.pdf https://www.rcpsych.ac.uk/files/pdfversion/OP100.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/213761/dh_124058.pdf