The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 280 No 7492 p273
8 March 2008

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• Darzi review
• Glaucoma
• Minor ailment scheme
• Community pharmacy (2)
• Clinical trials
• Hospital pharmacy

Letters to the Editor

Minor ailment scheme

Medicines shopping list

From Mr N. Ali, MRPharmS

Community pharmacy in Scotland has for a long time had a reputation for being at the forefront of progress. The minor ailment scheme (MAS) has been running in Scotland for over a year now. The vision was that it would allow pharmacists to prescribe pharmacy and general sale list medicines to patients who presented at the pharmacy with a minor ailment. The reality is different.

The minor ailment scheme is, in effect, medicines on demand. Customers come equipped with a written shopping list of medicines they want and present it to the pharmacist — little clinical intervention is required by the pharmacist, other than to interpret the patient’s handwriting. The knock-on effect is that MAS has drastically reduced over-the-counter sales.

Nadim Ali
Glasgow

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