Second pharmacy goes live with ETP
A pharmacy in Croydon, Surrey, has become the second pharmacy to go live with electronic transmission of prescriptions (ETP).
Last week Brigstock Pharmacy began receiving prescriptions electronically
from one of its local surgeries, Rainbow surgery, using the AAH system
Link Evolution. At the same time the pharmacy is continuing to receive
prescriptions from other local surgeries in the usual way.
Beran Patel, the pharmacy proprietor, told The Journal that although
only a small proportion of prescriptions are being received electronically
(about 15 prescriptions per day) he finds the system simple to use.
He explained that he has spent about £4,000 on a faster processor,
a barcode reader and a keyboard that recognises the swipe cards which
identify staff members. He added that he has also spent about one hour
with each member of staff training them to use the
system.
The Co-operative pharmacy in Keighley, West Yorkshire, was the first
to go live with ETP earlier this year (PJ, 5 March, p259). As part of
the national IT programme, Connecting for Health has said that all pharmacies
will be ETP-enabled by the end of 2007.
System suppliers Contractors should not commit themselves to a
particular system supplier for delivery of ETP-enabled systems until
more information is available on how ETP is going to be implemented,
the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee warned last week.
The PSNC says it hopes to provide news on ETP implementation in June.
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