Group items tagged

Learn about improvement activities (IA) reporting requirements for MIPS 2021 data submission. You can target 15 points for this category.

A new Information Standard has been published to support improved medication and sharing of allergy information across healthcare services in England. The move will standardise medication message content and help reduce medicines related errors and improve patient safety. It will also allow efficient sharing of medicine information between NHS and social care organisations, including hospitals, GP practices, residential care homes, mental health trusts, and community pharmacies. The Standard that came into effect in October "will save healthcare professionals valuable time accessing key medicines information, provide clinicians with access to a richer source of information, consistent across all care settings", said Shahzad Ali, NHS Digital clinical lead for the Interoperable Medicines Programme.

MIPS eligible clinicians! Do you know if you report MIPS 2021 as per the proper guidelines, you can earn up to 5% incentives and even qualify for a bonus pool worth $500 million?

MIPS has elevated the way Medicare part B providers get compensated. Each category, including Promoting Interoperability, has specific measures and guidelines that need to be fulfilled for MIPS 2021 reporting.

Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee expects the next round of negotiations to set the arrangements for the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework (CPCF) in 2022/23 - Year 4 of the five-year CPCF deal, to begin soon. The negotiator held a meeting on November 24 and 25 to discuss the burning issues affecting the sector and to plan for upcoming negotiations with the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and NHS England and NHS Improvement (NHSE&I). It aims to complete these negotiations by April, allowing ample time for contractors to make arrangement prior to the beginning of the financial year. PSNC vice-chair, and independent contractor, Bharat Patel said the entire sector is worried about the "outlook for pharmacies as we head into a difficult winter," and is working to find solutions. He noted that PSNC "will be bringing proposals for additional funding and support, particularly around the treatment of 'walk-in' patients, to the table, along with a heavy dose of realism for government and the NHS about the current challenges in the sector." While expecting a difficult round of discussion with the government, Patel remained optimistic about a favourable outcome for pharmacies.

Vial is a technology enabled Contract Research Organization (CRO) that delivers faster, higher quality trial outcomes.

The regulators have reduced the notice periods for change to supplementary opening hours for community pharmacy contractors from 1 October 2022. Following the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee (PSNC)'s discussions with the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and NHS England as part of Year 4 negotiations, it has been agreed that the required notice periods for changes to supplementary opening hours will reduce to five weeks. Community pharmacy contractors who want to change their supplementary opening hours are required by their terms of service to notify NHS England. "If a contractor wants to increase supplementary opening hours at the pharmacy, this can be done with no notice - but notification of the change must still be given to NHS England," said PSNC. "To decrease supplementary opening hours at the pharmacy, at least five weeks' notice must be given to NHS England prior to implementing the change."

The Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee (PSNC)'s 2022 Pharmacy Advice Audit revealed that more than 1.2 million consultations a week - or 65 million a year - are now being carried out by community pharmacy teams in England. This is an increase from 2021, when the audit results suggested that in total pharmacies were providing 58 million consultations per year. PSNC has published the findings of the audit of over 4,000 community pharmacies carried out earlier this year. During the audit, 82,872 informal patient consultations were recorded, with the average pharmacy completing 19 consultations per day. This suggests that more than 1.2 million informal consultations are taking place in community pharmacies in England every week. The audit helped to quantify the number of informal referrals being made to pharmacies by GPs and NHS 111, with 7,774 informal patient referrals into pharmacy coming from these routes; grossed up to a national level that means 117,000 cases per week. These are all referrals that could and should have been made by the NHS Community Pharmacist Consultation Service (CPCS).

Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee has submitted its evidence to the House of Commons Health and Social Care Select Committee's recent inquiry into 'The future of General Practice'. The committee, chaired by former health secretary Jeremey Hunt MP, had launched an inquiry to explore the future of NHS GP over the next five years. PSNC's evidence focused on what community pharmacy is currently doing to support GPs, and what more can be done in the future. The negotiator said: "We focused on how pharmacies supported patients throughout the pandemic as the only primary care access point offering healthcare advice on a walk-in basis.