Call to improve monitoring of CD requisition forms
Both the Royal Pharmaceutical Society and the National Pharmacy Association have called on the Home Office to introduce standardised serial numbered requisition forms for Controlled Drugs to improve monitoring of the circulation of CDs.
But responding to a Home
Office consultation (PJ, 26 May, p599), the
two organisations take the view that plans to require NHS pharmacy contractors
to send copies of CD requisitions to NHS pricing offices, along with
all CD prescriptions, do not go far enough to allow effective monitoring.
The Society’s response (PDF 20K) says that the forms should
be numbered serially to increase traceability and control over requisitions.
But
warning that
the system will be incomplete because pharmacies order CDs electronically
from wholesalers, the Society adds that requiring paper requisitions
for orders from wholesalers would go against the interest of patients,
since same day or next day supplies were often needed. It also points
out that wholesalers will not be expected to supply the NHS with details
of CD requisitions, making the audit trail even more incomplete.
For the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee, Stephen Lutener
(head of regulation) said that sending requisitions to pricing offices
would be a burden on pharmacy contractors, but that it was justifiable
to tighten the audit trail. However, he warned that the trail would be
incomplete, since requisitions from out-of-hours centres, and any other
organisation that obtained supplies from hospital pharmacies, fell outside
the scope of the proposed requirement.
All three organisations support proposals to abolish fixed-format CD
registers, but the NPA says that January 2008 is too soon for the change.
The NPA said that changing the rules will allow more information to be
recorded and that removing the requirement for registers to be in a set
format will make it easier to create a complete audit trail for CDs.
But the association added that this is a major change to the way pharmacists
record CD transactions and that more time should be allowed to manage
the change.
Although not integral to the formal consultation, the Home Office also
sought views on the possibility that CD prescriptions could be written
and transmitted electronically.
Again, all three organisations supported the
suggestion, but two of them
also expressed reservations.
The Society says that it would support the plan once IT systems were
sufficiently secure and once electronic transmission of non-CD prescriptions
was widespread.
The NPA warned that patients’ ability to get urgently needed CDs
could be put at risk by ETP because patients who asked for their electronic
prescriptions to be sent to a specific pharmacy without also taking a
paper token would be unable to get what they needed from another pharmacy
if the nominated pharmacy were out of stock.
The PSNC said that regulations to allow ETP for CD prescriptions should
be introduced as soon as possible.
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