Primary Care Pharmacy December 2000 Vol 1 No 5 p120

Leading article

Managing new drugs

Prescribing advisers and increasingly primary care group/local health care co-operative/local health group and practice-based pharmacists have to advise prescribers on the role and place in therapeutic strategy of new drugs as they become available. The National Institute for Clinical Excellence has a major role to play in making recommendations based on available evidence but drugs are often on the market for a considerable period before these reviews and guidelines become available. Does industry have a role in supporting pharmacists with this role? What do pharmacists want and what can industry provide? This issue gives the viewpoints of a practice pharmacist and a representative from a pharmaceutical company.

Primary care technicians
While working as a hospital pharmacist, I found that pharmacy technicians were an essential support for me in order to carry out my professional activities. After leaving secondary care, I quickly realised just how much they could also contribute at general practice level. Technicians were keen to be part of the primary care team but a few years ago opportunities were unavailable. Therefore, I was pleased recently to find that PCGs are beginning to make use of technicians' skills, creating new career options for them. In this issue we hear how one health authority has developed this role.

Nurse prescribing
At the end of October the Departments of Health in England and Scotland separately issued a consultation document on proposals to extend nurse prescribing. The contents are summarised on page 144, and the full documents can be found at www.doh.gov.uk and www.show.scot.nhs.uk, respectively.

The outcomes of this consultation will result in legislation changes leading to the extension of nurse prescribing by September, 2001. This has implications for all pharmacists working in primary care. Training programmes will be an essential component as, in many health authorities, pharmacists provide a large component of the training given to nurse prescribers. In addition, pharmacists working within surgeries may come across practice nurses prescribing for patients attending nurse-led specialist clinics, district nurses for prescribing for palliative care patients, practice nurses for minor ailments and health visitors prescribing for children and pregnant women. Prescribing advisers to PCG/Ts or equivalents will have to consider how best to advise and provide support for this new group of prescribers.

These new proposals will have implications for all of us. If you have not already done so, make sure you take this opportunity to make your comments known by responding to the consultation document.

Sheena Macgregor
Editor