PJ, February 2019, Vol 302, No 7922

GP receptionists referring patients to pharmacies in £100k pilot scheme

Community pharmacies in South Tyneside stand to receive over £100,000 through a scheme that will refer patients to community pharmacists by their local GP surgery.…

Brexit could have ‘moderately positive impact’ on medicine manufacturing in the UK, says Welsh report

Brexit could have a “moderately positive impact” on the development of the UK pharmaceutical sector in the long term, according to a Health Impact Assessment report published by Public Health Wales.…

Pharmacists’ powers to switch medicines to be reviewed one year after implementation

Government proposals that would enable pharmacists to switch patients’ prescriptions during a medicines shortage without consulting their doctor are set to be reviewed after one year.…

‘NHS Long-Term Plan’ integration efforts hindered by funding systems, says NAO

NHS funding systems “do not support” partnership working and integration, the National Audit Office has warned.…

Majority of NHS preregistration training providers achieve 100% pass rate in June 2018 assessment

NHS preregistration training providers continue to out-do other providers in the registration assessment, with most achieving 100% pass rates for first-attempt candidates, according to figures from the General Pharmaceutical Council.…

Pharmacists and technicians should reap benefits of NHS leadership programme

Health Education England (HEE) welcomes the attention placed on the Mary Seacole leadership programme in Hemant Patel’s ‘A message to Keith Ridge: unrealistic expectations are not the way forward’, and we are pleased to see that he and his local pharmaceutical committee colleagues …

NICE must provide patient decision aids if the tools are to become part of routine practice

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence’s (NICE) guideline NG5 — ‘Medicines optimisation: the safe and effective use of medicines to enable the best possible outcomes’ — sets recommendations around patient decision aids (PDAs) used in consultations in…