Courtesy of NICE
A consultation on the role and cost effectiveness of community pharmacy and its contribution to the promotion of health and wellbeing has been launched by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), the public body that provides national guidance and advice on health and social care in England and Wales.
NICE wants to know what should be included in the proposed national guideline and what should be left out before it draws up a draft that will go out for consultation in December 2016.
Issues it suggests should be considered include: the role of community pharmacy in national health promotion TV campaigns; the impact of health promotion material available through pharmacies; and whether the profession is effective in the ‘Make Every Contact Count’ initiative, a behavioural change approach that seeks to support people in making changes to their physical health and wellbeing.
NICE proposes to measure the impact and cost effectiveness of community pharmacy interventions that promote health and wellbeing and will assess interventions according to health outcomes, behavioural outcomes and quality of life improvements. It will not look at community pharmacy services that it says are unrelated to promoting health and wellbeing, such as dispensing services, vaccination programmes, self-care or urgent care, nor will commissioning arrangements for the community pharmacy contractual framework be included in the consultation.
The guideline, which is due to be finalised in June 2018, will apply to community pharmacy services on the high street, in supermarkets, GP surgeries, urgent care centres, colleges, care home and universities. It will not apply to hospital or online pharmacies.
The consultation on the guideline’s draft scope runs until 7 July 2016. The scope of the guideline will be published in September 2016.
The guideline has been commissioned by the Department of Health.
