The Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee on Tuesday (June 30) renamed itself as Community Pharmacy England, promising a "strengthened commitment" to
champion and engage with the sector.
"The name Community Pharmacy England better reflects the breadth of work that we do to both represent and support community pharmacies in England. We are their
champion," the pharmacy negotiator said.
Explaining that the rebranding exercise was in line with proposals put forward by the Review Steering Group (RSG), it said the rebrand was part of its Transforming
Pharmacy Representation (TAPR) work and that it would signal the beginning of a "new engagement strategy" to build stronger relationships with pharmacy owners.
"Becoming Community Pharmacy England is much more than a name change or a new logo, it is a driver for cultural change across our organisation.
"Our members want us to be more authoritative, representative, and influential, and rebranding gives us a clearer and stronger voice, helping us to better speak out
for community pharmacy."
A winter NHS crisis is inevitable unless the government acts now to reverse the worrying decline in community pharmacies. Years of government underfunding could
see 3,000 pharmacies in England - around a third of the network - having no option but to shut their doors to patients in the next few years.
That figure is based on independent assessments from Ernst & Young and UCL/LSE healthcare professors: it is not scaremongering - it is the reality the country faces.
Fifty per cent of pharmacies are already in financial distress because government funding has been falling in real terms since 2019 and that figure is predicted to
rise to 75 per cent within the next two years.
The government needs to act now and invest in pharmacy or sleepwalk into a healthcare disaster as we have seen with access to dentistry care. Prescription volumes
have risen consistently year-on-year by roughly 2 per cent which means fewer pharmacies doing more work and under greater pressure than a decade ago. Ten years ago
around 11,200 pharmacies in England were dispensing roughly 79,000 prescriptions; nowadays around 11,500 are dispensing roughly 89,000 prescriptions.
The secretary of state recently asked pharmacy to do more to avoid a winter NHS crisis and at the same time said there will be no new money to pay for those
additional services. This at a time when the network is in decline with random unplanned pharmacy closures - 640 closures since 2016 - and pharmacy staff face huge
workload pressures as prescription demand is increasing year-on-year. The government's approach to pharmacy literally does not add up: the pharmacy contract is not
fit-for-purpose now let alone dealing with a NHS winter crisis.
The National Pharmacy Association (NPA) is calling on NHS England and its member to pause and reflect before further implementing the pharmacy contraception
service.
NPA board met on Tuesday (25 April) to discuss the Pharmacy Contraception Service and the board decided that - with the community pharmacy sector at breaking
point - it cannot support the immediate roll out of this service.
The association believes that with no new funding for the service, and all existing funds in effect already allocated to other pharmacy activity, any payments
to the sector for delivery of the oral contraception service will ultimately be clawed back by NHS England.
Tweeting after the meeting yesterday, the NPA said: "We can't tell pharmacy owners what they can and can't do. But we can tell them the facts; fact number one is
that with no new funding currently available everyone will be a loser from the implementation of this service on the current terms."
NPA Vice-Chair Jay Badenhorst added: "We cannot be expected to take on more and more services without the increase in funding necessary to deliver them effectively.
Meanwhile, taking on additional work when current workload already exceeds capacity risks impacting negatively on the overall quality of care people experience in
pharmacies. We still believe this could, in future, be a great new pharmacy service, but not without the extra funding necessary to deliver it safely and
effectively. We want to offer women this extra support, but if it's worth doing it's worth doing properly."
EMIS Pinnacle, the leading Pharmacy First IT supplier, has begun implementing the GP Connect Update Record feature to all community pharmacies in England that
use PharmOutcomes.
Starting June 28, this new feature was made available for use with the Hypertension case-finding service and the Pharmacy contraception service, as announced by
the Community Pharmacy England (CPE).
The GP Connect Update Record will enable community pharmacies to securely share "structured" information with GP practices regarding consultations conducted under
the Pharmacy First programme, which includes minor illness and clinical pathways, along with Hypertension Case Finding and Pharmacy Contraception services
Live testing is underway with EMIS Pinnacle for Pharmacy First minor illness and clinical pathways.
There are plans to expand the system in the future to include updates for urgent supply of medicines under the Pharmacy First service.
EMIS Pinnacle is the third CPCF IT system supplier to offer this functionality, following Cegedim's Pharmacy Services system and Positive Solutions' HXConsult
system.
Community Pharmacy England (CPE) is gearing up to conduct a vital Pharmacy Advice Audit, calling on pharmacy owners and their teams to help measure the
increasing reliance on pharmacies within communities.
With years of financial strains impacting the sector, despite the much-needed £645 million recovery plan funding, the sector finds itself on the edge.
The launch of Pharmacy First sparked a notable surge in people seeking advice from community pharmacies, both within and beyond the funded service, as revealed
by recent sector polling.
To accurately assess this trend and advocate for sustainable funding, CPE is initiating an audit to gather data crucial for showcasing the extent of unfunded
care provided by community pharmacies.
Scheduled to commence this week, the Pharmacy Advice Audit will entail pharmacy teams documenting informal healthcare advice dispensed over a single day.
National pharmacy bodies have expressed their disappointment on the launch date for Tier 1 of the Pharmacy Contraception Service which has been announced by
NHS England (NHSE) as '24th April 2023′.
Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee (PSNC) said that this start date for the service has not been agreed with PSNC and is in direct contradiction of our
warning to Ministers that no new or expanded services can be rolled out in 2023/24 unless extra funding is put into community pharmacies.
Responding to this announcement, PSNC Chief Executive Janet Morrison said: "This is despite our warning last month that without additional funding, the roll-out of
Year 5 additional services and the Pharmacy Quality Scheme is neither feasible nor affordable. Community pharmacies are having to work harder and harder for less
money and many are at breaking point. And just this week the results of our 2023 Pharmacy Pressures Survey have confirmed the worsening situation.
Clearly our view is not because contractors don't see the benefit of the service. This is a much-anticipated service that could deliver real benefits to patients and
community pharmacies are always eager to support public health initiatives. But capacity in the sector is now so stretched that more money is needed to safely
resource additional work.
We have repeated our concerns to the Department in recent days and reminded them of the potential for a properly funded community pharmacy sector to play a greater
role in providing clinical solutions and relieving pressures elsewhere in primary care."
Increased cooperation between countries is needed to ensure better regulation of online pharmacies, said authors of a new report - 'Online pharmacy operations and distribution of medicines', published by the International Pharmaceutical Federation's (FIP) Community Pharmacy Section.
The report presents findings of a global survey of pharmacy organisations covering various aspects, such as type of medicines supplied by these pharmacies in different countries, how the authenticity of online pharmacies can be verified, and the usage of e-prescriptions and shared patient health records.
Of the 79 countries responding to the survey, 51 per cent acknowledged that no regulation of online pharmacies exists.
A quarter of the respondents reported cases of irresponsible self-medication by consumers who had purchased medicines through online pharmacies.
A lack of regulation creates "an avenue for illegal pharmacies and may impact the overall quality of medicines and services offered to consumers," authors of
the report said.
Lars-Åke Söderlund, immediate past president of FIP's Community Pharmacy Section and co-editor of the report, said that the pandemic has increased preference for online services, including in the pharmacy sector.
The Local Pharmaceutical Committees (LPCs) has rebranded to be known as Community Pharmacy to present a strengthened and unified identity to the
local NHS, local government and other stakeholders, as the local voice of community pharmacy.
"There are now 58 LPCs in England. The number of LPCs has reduced from 69, with further consolidation expected by April 2024 to a network of 48 local organisations,"
said Community Pharmacy England.
"The changes mean there will be better alignment between LPCs and the 42 NHS Integrated Care Systems in England, who have taken on the responsibility for
commissioning pharmaceutical services delegated by NHS England."
"This marks a significant milestone, as similar to Community Pharmacy England, LPCs have been undergoing changes to respond to the Review Steering Group (RSG)
recommendations on pharmacy representation. The sector voted in favour of the RSG proposals in the summer of 2022, and since then progress has been made on many
of the changes at both local and national level as part of the Transforming Pharmacy Representation (TAPR) Programme."
NHS England has commissioned the Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) to develop guidance that helps community and hospital pharmacy teams across Britain to
reduce the impact of pharmacy services, pharmaceutical care and medicines on the environment.
The RPS said the Greener Pharmacy Guidance will enable pharmacies to self-assess their impact against the standards, benchmark and improve through evidence-based
activities and actions.
"I'm delighted our strong commitment to helping pharmacy reduce its environmental impact can now be taken to the next level through developing guidance and
accreditation for pharmacy teams," RPS president Professor Claire Anderson said.
"Medicines account for 25 per cent of carbon emissions within the NHS and this initiative underscores our commitment to promoting sustainable healthcare and
supporting the NHS's goal of achieving 'net zero' emissions by 2040."
Peter Morgan, medicines assistant director at NHS England, commented: "Pharmacy staff are involved in the purchasing and dispensing of almost every medicine used
in the NHS and the new Greener Pharmacy Guidance and Self-accreditation scheme will provide support for pharmacy professionals by outlining clear actions to deliver
more environmentally sustainable pharmacy practices."
The RPS said the guidance and digital self-assessment toolkit will integrate with carbon calculator tools to help pharmacy teams to measure their carbon footprint,
action plan to reduce use of carbon and improve sustainability.
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).
The national pharmacy bodies has created 'Save Our Pharmacies' campaign website to give new focus to calls for fair pharmacy funding in England.
The newly launched site contains key messages for public, politicians and stakeholders, and hosts campaign resources to be used by pharmacy teams.
The pharmacy bodies encourage members of the public and pharmacy teams to show their support for the campaign on social media, as well as signing the petition
and contacting their local MPs about fair funding.
A further resource in the form of a window poster is being printed and will shortly be mailed out to all community pharmacies in England.
It is the latest output of a joint programme of work being coordinated by PSNC, CCA, AIM and the NPA.
A recent report from Healthwatch England has highlighted that while people highly value the accessibility of community pharmacies, both in terms of
location and prompt service, they also encounter challenges in getting the most out of their pharmacy care experience.
The report titled 'Pharmacy: What People' is based on the research conducted by the organisation in November last year, involving 1,650 people who shared their
experiences of pharmacy services in England.
It showed the country's notable dependence on community pharmacies, with 72 per cent of respondents saying they have used a community pharmacy in the past three
months.
Usage of online pharmacies is considerably lower than community pharmacies, with only 18 per cent of individuals having used an online pharmacy in the past three
months, according to the report published on Tuesday (30 April).
In response to concerns raised by pharmacy owners, the government has decided to adjust the August threshold for the Pharmacy First service from 20 to 15
clinical pathways.
The ability of pharmacy owners to achieve the thresholds for the monthly Pharmacy First payments has been a topic of great concern.
Community Pharmacy England (CPE) has been actively discussing this issue over the last few weeks with the Department of Health and Social Care and NHS England.
Ministers have now decided to adjust the August threshold for the Pharmacy First service to 15, CPE announced today (July 31).
Commenting on this decision, Janet Morrison, CEO of Community Pharmacy England said: "We are pleased that Ministers have listened to our concerns and acted quickly
to make an adjustment so soon after coming into office."
To maximise the benefits of the Pharmacy First service for patients, the NHS, and community pharmacies, Community Pharmacy England (CPE) has advised the
community pharmacists to to establish a robust relationship between community pharmacies and local general practices.
The news comes after several reports highlighted issues regarding GP referrals for the seven minor ailment conditions under the Pharmacy First services.
According to the reports, many pharmacists claimed that "many GPs in England are not sending patients to them to be treated - and that some are refusing to
participate at all in the "groundbreaking" Pharmacy First scheme".
In response to foster better relationship with the GPs, CPE has said that strong local collaborations will enable general practice teams to confidently refer
patients to the Pharmacy First and other community pharmacy services where appropriate.
Moreover, the organisation emphasised implementation of long-term changes in practice will take time. The current focus on integrating GP referrals to Pharmacy
First will likely require sustained effort over several months or longer.
Shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting outlined his plans for NHS reform on Friday (21 April), where he also mentioned a desire to see pharmacies take on more
workload and pharmacists' clinical skills to be better utilised.
In his speech, he also expressed concern at warnings from the pharmacy sector and pharmacy closures.
The Company Chemists' Association (CCA) appreciated Shadow Health Secretary's desire to enhance pharmacies' role in primary care reform but also stated that the
sector is in urgently needs a funding injection.
Dr. Nick Thayer, Head of Policy at the Company Chemists' Association (CCA) comment: "We are pleased to see the Shadow Health Secretary recognise the enhanced role
that pharmacies should play in primary care reform.
Mr Streeting wants to see care brought closer to people's homes and more front doors into the NHS. With 89.2% of the population located within a 20-minute walk of
a pharmacy, pharmacies do just that. They are essential to realising his vision of a 'neighbourhood health service'.
Pharmacies could free up over 42m GP appointments annually, including 10m vaccination appointments.
Urgent same-day appointments for minor conditions in pharmacies will immediately benefit patients by increasing GP access. The first step is for the Government to
immediately commission a fully-funded Pharmacy First service in England.
Data crunched by an online pharmacy delivery company paints a concerning picture for the pharmacy sector in England.
Gophr's 'Prescription For Pressure' initiative reveals a challenging time for the sector and is supported by separate analysis by the BBC showing that the number
of pharmacies in England is at its lowest since 2010.
In addition, new powers being introduced for pharmacists to prescribe common prescription drugs and perform routine tests create an even greater workload for already
overstretched pharmacists.
Gophr's data reveals that:
* Each pharmacy in England serves an average of 6,078 people.
* In 2022, pharmacists dispensed 1.043 billion prescriptions, 26.3 million more than 2021.
* A single pharmacy in England dispensed 248 prescriptions a day on average in 2022.
Based on the most up-to-date statistics from the Office for National Statistics, NHS England and Statista, Gophr's calculations show that pharmacists have around 116
seconds to dispense a prescription, which is less time than the 180 seconds it takes to make a Quarter Pounder at McDonald's.
The Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee (PSNC) has raised concerns over the NHS ad campaign highlighting how community pharmacies can support patients
with non-health advice amidst the growing pressure on pharmacies.
It believes the campaign will only 'worsen' the pressure on pharmacies.
"It is always deeply concerning to see campaigns directing people to pharmacies without any regard for the pressures they are under: it is irresponsible and extremely
unhelpful," said PSNC Chief Executive Janet Morrison.
She called the campaign 'particularly irritating' just weeks after the committee rejected a series of proposals from NHS England and DHSC on relief measures to ease
pressure on pharmacies as being totally inadequate.
"NHS England Board Members have noted the pressure on pharmacies - so why are their teams so often acting to make these pressures worse? We need to see a radical
change in how NHS England treats pharmacies and we're continuing to press for that via our influencing and campaigning work," she added.
The NHS launched the new campaign on Monday (27 February) to highlight how high-street pharmacies can support patients with non-urgent health advice for minor
conditions including coughs, aches and colds.
The Health and Social Care Committee (HSCC) has announced the appointment of six specialists to scrutinise the government's progress made on its commitments
to pharmacy services in England on Wednesday (26 April).
"They will work alongside the core members of the Expert Panel to produce a report evaluating Government progress across nine of the Government's own commitments
across the four areas. A CQC-style rating from "inadequate" to "outstanding" will be awarded against each specific pledge with a final overall rating given," said
DHSC.
Professor Dame Jane Dacre, Chair of the Expert Panel, said: "The role of pharmacy in delivering care whether in hospital, the community or primary care has never
been more important.
"The Government has made a number of commitments aimed at improving pharmacy services and we'll be looking at the progress to achieve these targets.
"In the process of our evaluation we'll be hearing from stakeholders from across the industry, including the pharmacy workforce and NHS and independent providers
of pharmacy services. We'll be considering pledges covering frontline services as well as the education and training of the workforce."
National Pharmacy Association (NPA) chief executive, Mark Lyonette, is one of six panel members with specialist expertise in pharmacy. They will work alongside five
standing members who are all renowned healthcare policy experts and professionals. Professor Dame Jane Dacre will chair.
In its response to a Freedom of Information Request (FOI), the NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) has confirmed a net decrease of 101 pharmacies
in England - with 371 closures and 270 new contracts. Meanwhile, the General Pharmaceutical Council data projected a drop of 43 registered pharmacies in England,
Wales, and Scotland for the year ending March 31, 2023, compared to the preceding period.
The data, released by business advisor Christie & Co in its annual pharmacy market review on Sept. 5, revealed a total of 14,328 pharmacies across all four UK
country regions as of March 31, 2023, indicating a 0.3 per cent decrease from the previous year. Corporate operators experienced a net reduction of 249 pharmacies,
while the total number of independent operators remained consistent with 2022.
According to the study, the corporate sector saw the most substantial shift, with a 13.7 per cent reduction in businesses operating 300 or more pharmacies.
Following closely, groups managing 11 to 15 pharmacies experienced a 5.6 per cent decrease. Christie & Co attributed this shift in group size to operators
acquiring additional pharmacies through corporate disposal opportunities throughout the year.
Eighty-five per cent of adults responding to a survey commissioned by the National Pharmacy Association (NPA) have agreed that community pharmacies are
underfunded and that the sector needs more investment to be able to do the work it does.
The survey of 1,000+ adults in England was carried out online between August 26 and 30 by an agency called Research Without Barriers (RWB) on behalf of the NPA.
Pharmacies in England are now paid less for providing NHS services than they were before the Covid-19 pandemic, after years of real terms cuts.
Seventy-four per cent respondents think it's unfair that community pharmacies in England have had no increase in funding for eight years, despite rising business
costs.
When asked whether it's fair or unfair that pharmacies in England are now paid less for providing NHS services than they were before the pandemic, 81 per cent of
people replied that it's unfair.