85: HealthTech Hour with Steve Roest - Episode 8585: HealthTech Hour with Steve Roest - Episode 85
UK Health Radio Podcast
HealthTech Hour host Steve Roest talks with Day Lewis co‑CEO Jay Patel about the true value of community pharmacy, from Covid response and clinical services to the blood pressure check that revealed his own hidden heart disease. The conversation blends family-business history, system-level pressures and a clear call to take action on your health while there’s still time.
50:20•29 Sept 2026
From Back-Room Price Guns to Life-Saving Blood Pressure Checks
Episode Overview
- Community pharmacies act as accessible, trusted anchors in their neighbourhoods, often seeing patients more frequently than GP surgeries.
- An NHS hypertension service delivered through pharmacies helped identify Jay Patel’s severe heart disease and led to life-saving bypass surgery.
- Pharmacies remained open and heavily used during Covid, despite limited support and protection, reinforcing their frontline role.
- Independent prescribing and clinical services mean pharmacists can now manage many common conditions and long-term illnesses more directly.
- Technology and AI can reduce admin and improve clinician communication, but face-to-face human contact remains the real ‘magic’ in patient care.
“I was a walking heart attack, waiting to happen.”
Curious about how others navigate their health journeys? This conversation between HealthTech Hour host Steve Roest and Day Lewis co‑CEO Jay Patel gives a ground-level view of how community pharmacies are quietly holding the NHS together – and sometimes saving lives in the process. You’ll hear Jay explain how his family-run pharmacy group has grown from a single shop in 1975 to hundreds of branches, all while keeping people at the centre of everything.
He talks about growing up “in the back of a pharmacy”, being gently steered into pharmacy by his father, and now sharing the CEO role with his brother and sister, each playing to their own strengths. The heart of the chat is what community pharmacy really does for patients. Jay explains how pharmacies became the “coalface” of care during Covid, staying open without PPE while other services shifted online.
He shares how a simple blood pressure check in one of his own pharmacies – part of an NHS hypertension service – led to the discovery of serious coronary artery disease and a life-saving heart bypass. As he puts it, he was “a walking heart attack, waiting to happen”.
There’s plenty on the future too: AI as a helpful feedback tool for clinicians, the growth of independent prescribing by pharmacists, and the tension between digital convenience and the irreplaceable value of face-to-face contact. Jay is frank about funding pressures, drug shortages and how pharmacies often get paid less than they spend on medicines, yet still keep saying yes to patients.
Threaded through is a bigger message: build trust, stay curious, take action, and remember life is short – so use the help that’s right in front of you. Could a simple chat in your local pharmacy change your health story?
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