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Each integrated care board (ICB) or ICB cluster will receive £51,000 to support the implementation of independent prescribing from autumn 2026.
In a letter sent to ICBs in England on 31 July 2026, NHS England said that the funding, which is only for 2026/2027, is “solely to recognise the additional work required by ICBs to develop processes to support prescribing by community pharmacy”.
ICBs can use the funding “as they see fit” to obtain support, which may include support from local pharmaceutical committees, the letter said.
It also informed ICBs of five actions they must take to get ready for independent prescribing, as well as deadlines for those actions.
The actions outlined in the letter include establishing a process to identify, approve and onboard pharmacies by August 2026; collaborating with local stakeholders; and onboarding all eligible pharmacies that have expressed an interest in becoming a prescribing pharmacy from autumn 2026 — by which time legal directions will have been published.
ICBs must also ensure that at least 95% of onboarded pharmacies are delivering prescriber-led consultations by March 2027, the letter added.
On the same day that the guidance was published, the NHS also published ‘Commissioning guidance for community pharmacy prescribing-based services‘ to help ICBs get ready for the changes.
Mahendra Patel, chair of the Royal College of Pharmacy’s English Pharmacy Advisory Council, welcomed the publications.
“Clear guidance helps commissioners, employers, pharmacists and pharmacy technicians to develop and deliver clinical services safely and effectively, and we urge ICBs and employers to work closely with pharmacy teams to ensure these requirements are in place,” he said.
“These publications provide a framework to support the safe expansion of prescribing services across community pharmacy.”
NHS-funded independent prescribing is being introduced as part of the ‘Community pharmacy contractual framework’ (CPCF) for 2026/2027, which came with a £3.636bn funding package and represents an funding increase of 10.3% (£340m) compared with the previous year.
In a briefing on the CPCF for 2026/2027, published in May 2026, Community Pharmacy England said that pharmacist prescribers will be able to prescribe within the existing Pharmacy First clinical pathways and the pharmacy contraception service, as well as provide up to five new Pharmacy First prescribing-only pathways.
In addition, ICBs may commission local prescribing services; however, an investigation published by The Pharmaceutical Journal in May 2026 revealed that not all ICBs had done so.
The details from NHS England come shorty after the first cohort of newly qualified pharmacists who will be independent prescribers on the day of registration passed the Common Registration Assessment.
On 31 July 2026, NHS England also published a ‘Professional assurance framework for delivering NHS community pharmacy clinical services‘, which states that employers must ensure that pharmacists involved in prescribing are qualified to do so, have appropriate professional indemnity arrangements and are listed in the NHS prescriber details dataset.
Pharmacists who will be involved in prescribing must complete a declaration of fitness for purpose — including their prescribing scope of practice — and submit this to their employer, the framework said.
The assurance framework also gives guidance relating to pharmacy technicians involved in pharmaceutical services, including working under a patient group direction.
