The ICCPE session at the Pharmaceutical Society of Ireland Conference in October expanded on the theme of Medicines for Children, which was the subject of the Centre's highly successful national training initiative in spring. Introducing the event, ICCPE Director, Ms. Orla Sheehan, outlined the outcomes of this training initiative and its aim "to try to promote an ethos of child-centred care." "Today is all about building on that initial strategy," Ms. Sheehan said.

Mr. Ian Costello, Senior Editor of the BNF for Children (BNFc) outlined the arduous process involved in the collation and publication of this newly published formulary. "The biggest challenge we faced was making it relevant to all healthcare professionals in primary care, secondary care and tertiary care," Mr. Costello said. In previous paediatric formularies, he noted that "there were lots of contradictions and inconsistencies that we had to resolve."

The collation of the BNFc involved the work of four collaborators: the Neonatal and Paediatric Pharmacists Group (NPPG), the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH), the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain (RPSGB) and the British Medical Association (BMA). Similar to its distribution of the BNF, the British Department of Health has purchased the BNFc and made it available to every prescriber and pharmacist in the UK.

As well as the provision of standard information on drugs used in children, clear indications of the licensing status for each drug and recommendations on when specialists should supervise, manage or prescribe a particular treatment, the BNFc has brought a lot of information from the pharmaceutical industry into the public domain. Mr. Costello refers to this newfound access to previously unavailable information as "one of the side effects of this process."

BNFc will be revised and published every year and an online version is also available. Ian Costello pointed to the fact that a lot of new information is emerging in the area of medicines use in children. "The BNFc will be the conduit for emerging information," he said.

Professor Pat Bush of Georgetown University School of Medicine, Washington, first started conducting research on medicines and children in the early 1980s and was one of the earliest pioneers of child-friendly information on medicines. At this time, she noted that "The slogan 'don't do drugs' was everywhere. But this common activity that they [children] see every day of their lives - no-one was teaching them about it." Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, Professor Bush formulated a wide body of research in this area in the United States and performed comparative studies in 10 European countries, in Armenia, Malaysia and Nepal. As she noted, the results among the countries surveyed were enough to show that "not every country has to start de novo. You can take existing educational materials and adapt them for your own country."

As a visiting scholar with the U.S. Pharmacopeia, Professor Bush directed the Children and Medicines Programme (available at www.usp.org/audiences/consumers/children/) and developed the Ten Guiding Principles for Teaching Children and Adolescents About Medicines. In her presentation, she stated that people's "feelings, beliefs and attitudes are being formed at a very early age. You can't wait 'til they're older to inform them about medicines." She pointed out that medicines education must be taught "gradually at the appropriate time, at the appropriate development level."

A performance by Doctor Merry-Go-Round and Doctor Fairy-Dust, Clown Doctors with the Humour Foundation of Ireland provided a playful interlude to proceedings. The Humour Foundation's aim is to promote the health benefits of humour by making the hospital experience less traumatic for children. It currently provides a Clown Doctor service in Crumlin Hospital with the aim of developing similar services in hospitals throughout the country.

Ms. Katrii Hameen-Anttila from Finland and Dr. Natalia Cebotarenco from Moldova each outlined innovative programmes which have been developed in their respective countries to provide medicines education to children. Ms. Hameen-Anttila outlined how the National Curriculum for Health Education (2004) has made the provision of medicines information a compulsory aspect of the health education programme provided in Finnish schools and the research that shaped the development of teaching materials. Dr. Cebotarenco presented the outcomes of a Moldovan project which sought to reduce unnecessary antibiotic use for colds and flu. A school-based programme was developed and delivered by fifty teenagers who presented six lessons to their classmates on appropriate treatments for colds and flu.

An Irish context for medicines information for children was given by Ms. Frances Foley, who is currently undertaking a research project on children's perceptions of medicines and the development of child-friendly educational materials as part of an MSc. in Community Pharmacy. To date, her research has included focus group discussions in two primary schools to gauge children's levels of knowledge about and their experiences of taking medicines. A series of drawings created by these schoolchildren gave an interesting and diverse insight into children's perceptions of illness and medicines. Ms. Foley will continue this research by surveying parents, teachers and pharmacists. She concluded the day's presentations with the following advice for pharmacists when dealing with children: "We need to come out from behind the counter. We need to get down on our knees - not to pray for higher margins - but to look the customers of tomorrow in the eye and engage with them."

Julie Cronin