Dedicated pharmacy budgets needed in primary care, says IPF
Primary care trusts must have dedicated pharmacy budgets if community pharmacists are to be able to develop their roles, the Independent Pharmacy Federation believes.
In its response to the All-Party
Pharmacy Group’s inquiry into
the future of pharmacy (PJ, 24 June, p739), the IPF says that one of
the main barriers to progress in the development of pharmacy services
is the false expectation that GP commissioning will cascade sustainable
funds and development to community pharmacy.
“A dedicated budget should be allocated to pharmacy to avoid a
wrangle with the medical profession and PCTs charged with the responsibility
to implement extended medicines management,” it says. The PCT should
commission enhanced services from a “national menu” and purchase
services assessed to be required as a result of a robust local pharmaceutical
care needs assessment. Ring-fencing of funds could even be taken to higher
organisational levels, the IPF goes on to suggest.
“We have not observed PCT willingness to support pharmacy innovation;
there is concentration on keeping within the allocated budget and practice-based
commissioning will take priority. Opportunities would be greater if budgets
were consolidated regionally or nationally because funds could be allocated
to specific developmental projects on a consistent basis for pharmacy
input.
“There would be less post-coding of services and better public
recognition of what should be available if there was a better roll out
of national
templates. … We suggest the creation of a new directorate of integrated
care at strategic health authority level to oversee PCT operational effort
in structuring collaboration between medical and pharmaceutical effort,
together with other health care professionals as required,” the
IPF adds.
In addition, the IPF suggests that the new community pharmacy contract
in England may have curbed, rather than augmented, the development of
relationships between community pharmacists and GPs.
“It could be argued that the pharmacy contract has retarded the
development of relationships,” the IPF says. “Increased paperwork is
not well received by doctors, which influences their perception of added
value. Practice-based commissioning and the loss of community pharmacists
on professional executive committee have increased tribalism,” it
adds. |
The
Pharmaceutical Journal
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