The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 278 No 7453 p601
26 May 2007

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News summary

SPGC is now Community Pharmacy Scotland

The Scottish Pharmaceutical General Council's transition to Community Pharmacy Scotland was completed earlier this month and is highlighted in the organisation's latest Vision newsletter, which will be sent to pharmacists this week.

At its first meeting, CPS appointed Martin Green as chairman and James Semple as vice-chairman; both previously held the same posts at SPGC. Mr Green said that the new name reflected CPS’s role in ensuring the abilities and responsibilities of community pharmacists are recognised in a modernising NHS. A new logo and website for CPS will be unveiled shortly.

In the newsletter, CPS reports that the new “contract preparatory payments”— payments for work required before the introduction of the acute medication service and chronic medication service — are currently being finalised. It reveals that the payments will be made in stages throughout the year and will be linked to activities such as:

• A spring clean for the pharmacy’s patient medication record system (to ensure information is up to date and accessible)

• Work around the business rules for pricing (relating to endorsing prescriptions)

• Provision of information to CPS for remuneration modelling

• Training packages from NHS Education for Scotland on certain disease states

CPS plans to set out how these payments will fit in with the rest of contractors’ remuneration by publishing an updated version of the financial framework it produced last year.