Electronic transmission of prescriptions put on hold
Government plans to introduce national electronic transmission of prescriptions (ETP) in England have hit a set back after an independent evaluation of the three pilots testing the system.
The evaluation report concluded that ETP is technically viable but it
did not recommend that any of the three pilots be the model for the future.
But despite the evaluation report, which was co-ordinated by the Sowerby
Centre for Health Informatics in Newcastle, the Department of Health
confirmed that it still supports the principle of ETP.
In a statement a spokesman said that the “functionality” of
ETP, the way that the system works, will be included in the development
of the integrated care record service (ICRS) which is the shared electronic
patient record.
He explained: “During the development of the emerging ETP strategy,
it was agreed that elements of ETP functionality would be best included
within the parameters of ICRS. The solution for the remaining elements
of the ETP programme will be decided in due course.”
The National Pharmaceutical Association was disappointed that the Government
has decided to include ETP as part of the ICRS and was not pursuing it
as a separate project which many people had expected following the establishment
of the pilots.
NPA commercial director Richard Maw said: “I think for the time
being this is a nail in the coffin of ETP being rolled out nationally.
As part of the ICRS the DoH will be focusing on the clinical elements
of ETP which will include details of what the patient was prescribed
and what was dispensed, which isn’t really one of the big winners
of the initiative as far as medicines management is concerned.
“From a medicines management perspective the biggest benefit of
ETP is the ease of transfer of prescription from the GP to the pharmacist
and
from the pharmacist to the Prescription Pricing Authority.”
Daniel Lee managing director of Pharmacy2U, one of the companies involved
in the ETP pilots, said: “The evaluation report said that ETP was
technically viable which is what it is all about. There were some technical
problems in the beginning. If they had come back 12 months later they
would have seen huge benefits. I think it will be used in the future.
The national ICRS will have this huge data spine and ETP will be part
of that.”
The ETP pilot evaluation report said that ETP was slow to get going because
of technical difficulties and problems recruiting patients.
The need to gain signed permission from each patient was time consuming
and could hamper wider introduction of the scheme, it pointed out.
But pharmacist and GP criticisms of the system were based mainly on temporary
problems with new software and processes which, the report suggested,
could be overcome with additional development and training.
And it added that pharmacists running prescription collection services
remained confident that ETP would save time.
Separate schemes are underway in Wales and Scotland.
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