The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 275 No 7375 p595
12 November 2005

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Prescription Pricing Authority aims to save £20m a year

Costs of processing prescription payments are likely to be reduced by £20m, following the introduction of a new IT system according to the Prescription Pricing Authority.

The new system uses high-speed scanning equipment and intelligent character recognition software to capture printed information from prescription forms. It also features a “rules engine” that calculates the value of prescriptions based on what has been prescribed and how it is packaged. Michael King, director of planning and corporate affairs at the PPA, said that the new system will work well with the imminent electronic prescription service. “In essence, the new technology is able to improve our efficiency with paper prescriptions while we have got them but will also enable electronic prescription information to be processed via the rules engine,” he said.