Electronic repeat dispensing
Guidance issued by NHS England/Improvement in March 2020 asks primary care to consider putting all suitable patients on electronic repeat dispensing (‘eRD’) for when their next repeat prescriptions are due.
As part of its response to Covid-19, the Oxford AHSN is sharing resources produced by the Wessex Academic Health Science Network to support the wider deployment of eRD across GP practices in our region – Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Milton Keynes.
The full range of resources can be found on the Wessex AHSN website.
A summary of the key points is provided below.
Training and implementation essentials
• Outline – explanation of the NHS response needed for eRD during the Covid-19 pandemic and support for primary care to deliver that response
• Short video – training module from North of England Commissioning Support provides the complete ‘How to’ guide including SystmOne, EMIS and Vision
• Link to the eRD handbook, a comprehensive guide to eRD set-up
• Patient contact templates.
eRD enables patients on long-term, stable prescriptions to receive their medication at a pharmacy of their choice for up to 12 months, using the power of the Electronic Prescription Service (EPS).
Benefits of eRD in response to Covid-19
• Reduced footfall to GP practices and community pharmacies, supporting social distancing
• Reduced workload for prescribers allowing better prioritisation of resources
• Controlled management of the supply chain reducing the number of temporarily unavailable medicines
• Improved efficiency – effective eRD can save up to 46 minutes a day of GP time; if 80% of all repeats were managed through eRD 2.7 million GP hours could be saved.
Which patients are suitable?
• Patients on stable therapy
• Patients with long-term conditions
• Patients on multiple therapy e.g. hypertension, diabetes, asthma etc.
• Patients who can appropriately self-manage seasonal conditions.
To help support the response to Covid-19, the NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) has introduced a new streamlined service for GP practices to receive NHS numbers for patients who may be eligible for eRD. The NHSBSA will only be able to send NHS numbers to ‘nhs.net’ email addresses.
Collaboration is key to the successful implementation of eRD – Clinical Commissioning Groups must discuss plans with their local pharmaceutical committee (LPC) prior to switching patients to eRD. The process is outlined below:
1. The NHSBSA will contact GP practices to confirm whether they have an active ‘nhs.net’ email address
2. Once confirmed, the NHSBSA will send the practice an email with a password-protected ZIP file. This will contain the NHS Number and the name of the item prescribed for every patient that is potentially eligible for eRD
3. A clinician will review the patient records of those patients to ensure they are appropriate for eRD
4. The practice will arrange for verified patients to move to eRD.
What do patients need to know?
• Please click to view information for patients
• When making calls to patients switching to eRD you may wish to refer to this script developed by North East Hampshire and Farnham CCG
• NHSBSA information for patients.
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