The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 279 No 7478 p550
17 November 2007

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Minor ailment schemes need promotion, PSNC tells inquiry

National standardisation and promotion of a scheme for managing minor ailments at NHS expense in community pharmacies is essential, the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee has told a Parliamentary inquiry into GP access and health improvement in primary care.

In a written submission to the inquiry, the PSNC says that over half of all primary care trusts in England have commissioned local minor ailments services, including the free provision of medicines, from community pharmacies to try to improve access to care, to reduce inequality between people who can afford to buy medicines and those who cannot, and to give GPs more time to deal with more serious conditions.

The PSNC says that a number of these local schemes have been academically evaluated and that the results show that the management of minor, self-limiting conditions can be transferred successfully from GPs to community pharmacies and that this reduces GP workload.

Four advantages that the PSNC believes a nationally agreed service would offer over locally commissioned services are:

• Uniform quality and patient experience

• National promotion

• Confident referrals from other providers

• Reduced administration costs

The PSNC evidence also says that pharmacies can widen access to health care by providing locations from which non-pharmacy health professionals can practise.

The inquiry is being conducted by the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Primary Care and Public Health. One of the questions to which the inquiry is seeking an answer concerns whether or not it is appropriate for patients to be sent to pharmacies for advice on minor illnesses in order to give doctors more time to devote to patients who need their skills.

The President of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society is expected to give evidence to the inquiry on 13 December 2007.