Pharmacy

(asked on 13th March 2024) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps she is taking to audit Pharmacy First; and whether she plans to consult the pharmacy professions on its future.


Answered by
Andrea Leadsom Portrait
Andrea Leadsom
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
This question was answered on 20th March 2024

Pharmacy First was launched on 31 January 2024. The Department and NHS England will closely monitor the service. Additionally, the National Institute for Health and Care Research has commissioned a wrap-around evaluation of Pharmacy First, with a focus on antimicrobial resistance. There are no plans to change this service, which has only recently launched, but if any changes were proposed then we would consult Community Pharmacy England, as the representative body for all pharmacy contractors in England.

General practices (GPs) and their teams already refer patients to community pharmacies for a wide range of services. Pharmacy First, for minor illnesses, is built on the existing Community Pharmacy Consultation Service. NHS England has further engaged with GP representatives during the development and launch of Pharmacy First.

The Delivery plan for recovering access to primary care announced plans to significantly improve the digital infrastructure between GPs and community pharmacies. Pharmacy IT systems already generate automated emails to the patient’s GP following a consultation. We are taking this one step further for Pharmacy First. Later this year, pharmacy IT systems will send information about a Pharmacy First consultation directly into the GP’s workflow. This will be a first for the National Health Service, but will become the norm over time for other parts of the NHS, further reducing bureaucracy for GPs. Pharmacies will also have access to more parts of the patient’s GP record, and referrals will be streamlined.

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