In January 2026, Torbay Hospital in Torquay, Devon, introduced a new automated pharmacy robot to speed up dispensing and improve the accuracy and reliability of medicines for patients. The robot, named Spencer by pharmacy colleagues, was installed by Torbay and South Devon NHS Foundation Trust and is now supporting the inpatient pharmacy service.
The machine was supplied by Becton Dickinson U.K. Limited (BD). It stores, picks and dispenses medicines and has been configured to integrate with the Trust’s electronic patient record (EPR), taking digital prescriptions as part of the dispensing workflow. The robot is designed to optimise storage location based on demand, which helps the pharmacy team retrieve and supply treatments to wards more quickly.
The new technology is part of a larger plan to modernise the hospital, following a £14.2 million Emergency Department upgrade whose first phase opened in December 2025. By speeding up the preparation of ‘To Take Out’ (TTO) medicines for people leaving hospital, the robot is expected to accelerate discharges and help free up beds for new patients.
The Trust says the move is a major step towards a paperless system: the robot has been configured to work with the Trust’s new EPR, scheduled to go live in April 2026. Paul Foster, Chief Pharmacist, said the installation ‘marks a real step forward for our pharmacy service,’ noting that the robot will provide ‘speed, accuracy and reliability’ and free pharmacy staff from manual picking and prescription processing so they can spend more time working directly with patients on the wards.
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