"Please allow 5 working days..."

[gnawsome]

Southampton City Clinical Commissioning Group have put out leaflets stating that

"The way you order your repeat prescriptions is changing"
Part reads;
Please allow 5 working days from when you order your prescription...
and answers : Why is this happening? We want to put you in control of your medication...

How is that going to happen?
The extending of the waiting period (5 days) will obviously include 2 non working days, so a minimum of a week when no bank holidays are due - so maybe 9 days.
I am at a loss to see how this will better enable patients to manage their medications.

I also question that it will be of any benefit to the producers of the prescriptions who will seemingly extend the same task over 5 working days rather than 3.
Or am I being the nuisance here?

[Alaric]

I also question that it will be of any benefit to the producers of the prescriptions who will seemingly extend the same task over 5 working days rather than 3.
Or am I being the nuisance here?

Other Health Authorities seem to be doing this. One could suppose counter signing prescriptions is a very boring job for the medical profession that they would like any excuse to defer.

By way of mitigation, GP practices may now allow you to request repeat prescriptions online and pharmacies will text when it's ready to collect. That at least saves trips to the Pharmacy or Surgery.

[pochisoldi]

Southampton City Clinical Commissioning Group have put out leaflets stating that

"The way you order your repeat prescriptions is changing"
Part reads;
Please allow 5 working days from when you order your prescription...
and answers : Why is this happening? We want to put you in control of your medication...

How is that going to happen?
The extending of the waiting period (5 days) will obviously include 2 non working days, so a minimum of a week when no bank holidays are due - so maybe 9 days.
I am at a loss to see how this will better enable patients to manage their medications.

I also question that it will be of any benefit to the producers of the prescriptions who will seemingly extend the same task over 5 working days rather than 3.
Or am I being the nuisance here?

My money is on one of the following

Option A1 - Bulk handling at the surgery
All requests for repeat prescriptions will be left in a pile* until a certain morning or afternoon on a certain day of the week.
The doctor will then plough through those requests in one go.
(* - used in the loose sense, more likely keyed in by a receptionist, for handling via a PC)

Option A2 - Bulk handling at commissioning group level
As for A1, but a doctor employed by the CCG does the review on behalf of multiple GP practices.

Option B - surgeries with a qualified nurse practioner
Repeat prescription requests will be filtered via a nurse practitioner. Requests which are straight forward, and within the prescribing powers of the NP will result in a prescription signed by them. Requests which require review, or are outside the powers of the NP get passed to a doctor, who will deal with them in bulk (hence introducing a delay).

Option C - No change
Doctor fits in handling repeat prescriptions as part of their normal workload, and the prescriptions go out as before.
This happens at certain practices in cloud cuckoo land, where the number of GPs matches the demand for services, so that GPs don't end up with back to back consultations every day of the week.

My advice is to sign up for one of the online repeat prescription services, in the vain hope that any delay in authorisation is counterbalanced by faster transmission of the script to the pharmacy.

[staffordian]

It's our pharmacy who seem to be making "improvements" which slow things down round here.

If we request a repeat prescription from our GP they send the prescription electronically to our nominated pharmacy.

The GP says allow three working days for it to arrive at the pharmacy, after which we could collect the medication. Often, the prescription was at the pharmacy the day after requesting it.

The latest ruse by the pharmacy is to have the prescription made up at a "hub".

We requested a repeat last Thursday and to be on the safe side, I left it the three days and this morning battled through the snow to collect the meds from the pharmacy, only to be told the medication was not there. They received the request yesterday, but had to forward it to this "hub" then wait for it to be delived to the pharmacy. Maybe this afternoon, certainly by tomorrow.

And this is supposed to be more efficient?

Rant over

[Watis]

I live in an area where this system has been running for a year or two now.

The online prescription service does not make things any faster, you still need to allow a week for the prescription to reach your designated pharmacy.

It's unclear whether the online system requires any input from the surgery before the request is processed.

It's also unclear what provision has been made for patients who, for whatever reason, are unable to use the online service.

Watis

[Alaric]

And this is supposed to be more efficient?

At least one major chain, Boots, can notify you by text that a prescription is ready for collection. That's progress I suppose.

But beware of a restrictive practice. For some legal reason, the act of handing over a bag of pre-packaged pills has to be in the physical presence of a pharmacist. If you use a store with just one or two pharmacists, you might arrive and find the pharmacist at lunch or taking a break.

[Watis]

At least one major chain, Boots, can notify you by text that a prescription is ready for collection. That's progress I suppose.

But the texts don't always get sent . . .

But beware of a restrictive practice. For some legal reason, the act of handing over a bag of pre-packaged pills has to be in the physical presence of a pharmacist. If you use a store with just one or two pharmacists, you might arrive and find the pharmacist at lunch or taking a break.

That's true - and in my case I also have to answer a trick question correctly. This is usually 'What is your address?'

Watis

[staffordian]

And this is supposed to be more efficient?

At least one major chain, Boots, can notify you by text that a prescription is ready for collection. That's progress I suppose.

But beware of a restrictive practice. For some legal reason, the act of handing over a bag of pre-packaged pills has to be in the physical presence of a pharmacist. If you use a store with just one or two pharmacists, you might arrive and find the pharmacist at lunch or taking a break.

The pharmacy I used today told me they could text me when it was ready. I offered my number but they couldn't manage to get to the right screen on their new handheld device to enter it...

[AF62]

But beware of a restrictive practice. For some legal reason, the act of handing over a bag of pre-packaged pills has to be in the physical presence of a pharmacist. If you use a store with just one or two pharmacists, you might arrive and find the pharmacist at lunch or taking a break.

After trying Boots - queues and the pharmacists at lunch issue, Tesco - even longer queues, I have been using an old fashioned tiny local pharmacy with one pharmacist. However it actually closes for lunch for an hour, closes on Saturday afternoons, and is closed on Sunday, but at least when you turn up you know they wont be at lunch!

As an aside, if your GP surgery supports the NHS app I would take a look as it is quite good. You can do repeat prescriptions and it shows you when last ordered and when you can next order, although it doesn't say when ready for collection, my GP surgery and pharmacy are efficient and they are always there in the promised three days.

[Arborbridge]

As an aside, if your GP surgery supports the NHS app I would take a look as it is quite good. You can do repeat prescriptions and it shows you when last ordered and when you can next order, although it doesn't say when ready for collection, my GP surgery and pharmacy are efficient and they are always there in the promised three days.

I am fairly impressed with our system which sends the prescription to my local pharmacy - I always use our little local one that's been there for decades rather this new outfit attached to the surgery.

The only hiccup occurs when I need to order and the system thinks I'm not yet due to order, or if the meds are not prescirbed because I apparently haven't had a recent blood test. But I did have a blood test! The problem is that the results are on the hospital system, not the GP system. Unfortunately, the duty GP can never seem to get his/her head around looking on the hospital system without me reminding them - that's despite the surgery manager putting a note on my file.

But...mostly it works OK.

[didds]

I
We requested a repeat last Thursday and to be on the safe side, I left it the three days and this morning battled through the snow to collect the meds from the pharmacy, only to be told the medication was not there. They received the request yesterday, but had to forward it to this "hub" then wait for it to be delived to the pharmacy. Maybe this afternoon, certainly by tomorrow.

And this is supposed to be more efficient?

Rant over

Rant away - you've every reason to do so.

Frankly even more reason to use an online pharmacy., the presecription goes directly to "a hub" that then send the drugs directly to you, cutting out the delay of that middle man aka the pharmacist. I would be the very first peron to say we shoud all support local servicces such as local pharmacies, but the pharmacy you mention isn't doing a pharmacy role - its is just a middle man in a hub-handling system that can only add delays anyway.

didds

[didds]

At least one major chain, Boots, can notify you by text that a prescription is ready for collection. That's progress I suppose.

But the texts don't always get sent . . .

This - exactly. Then allied to our local Boots which only has one pharmacist it seems whose lunch breaks seem to always coincide with mine so if I go to the branch means I cant actually receive my presscription.

"He'll back at work in 40 minutes" I get toid .
"So will I be" I respoind.

Or rather did. I moved to boots originally because the pharamcy I used to use became totally useless after changing hands, losing prescriptions constantly, then if not losing the scrip(t?) would then mislay the medication. Their frantic attempts to find the scrip(t?) and/or drugs in mutiple places suggested to me their systems lacked any cohesion. The other pharmacy in town is in a supermarket furthest from home of the three, and always has queues w-a-a-a-a-a-y long, presumably because people use it rather than the other two.

So now I use an online pramacy - my repeat request take seconds and the drugs arrive in the post really speedily, and certainly quicker than a more traditioonal method.

didds

[staffordian]

I
We requested a repeat last Thursday and to be on the safe side, I left it the three days and this morning battled through the snow to collect the meds from the pharmacy, only to be told the medication was not there. They received the request yesterday, but had to forward it to this "hub" then wait for it to be delived to the pharmacy. Maybe this afternoon, certainly by tomorrow.

And this is supposed to be more efficient?

Rant over

Rant away - you've every reason to do so.

Framkly even more reason to use oan online phranacy., the presecription goes directly to "a hub" tyhat then send the drugs directly to you, cutting out the delay of that middle man aka the pharmacist. I would be the very first peron to say we shoud all support local servicces such as local pharmaciesm, but the pharamcy you mention isnt doing a pharacy role - nits is just a middle man in a hub-handling systemn that can only add delays anyway.

didds

Our pharmacy used to be a local Co-op one within easy walking distance, and I was keen to support local shops. The Co-op sold several of their businesses a while ago and the pharmacies all went to a new company. The staff, including the regular pharmacist, are all the same but the systems are now very different. Time will tell if they keep the staff or they become disillusioned.

But whilst we still retain a few local businesses, including this one, I'm still inclined to use them.

[tjh290633]

Our local pharmacy is Lloyd's. If you renew on line or in person, the prescription goes electronically to the pharmacy, thence to an assembly hub in Ruislip, then the made up prescription is sent by van to the local shop. There is always a 4 working day gap, so request on Monday, collect on Saturday. I am about to set off to the village to collect our repeat prescriptions, requested last Thursday.

Previously they only started to assemble them when you came to collect them, and if they were out of something, you got a deficiency chit. Urgent items they will still make up on the spot, but for regular renewals the new system is much better.

TJH

[Stompa]

Our (Rowlands) pharmacy changed to a hub system a few months ago. That, along with the departure of a very efficient pharmacist, has been a complete disaster. Prior to this new system it was a 3 working day wait. When the new system was introduced that went up to 5wd, and shortly thereafter to 7wd (with the advice to add on even more days over the Christmas period). However, they struggle to even meet those timescales. My prescription is frequently not available when they say, and I've found myself having to make three or even four visits.

All this means there are usually long queues of disgruntled customers, so you might have to wait 20 minutes to be told that your prescription isn't ready. I heard a locum pharmacist say that she would never work at that store again because of the amount of abuse she had had to suffer. Pretty much all of the regular staff have left, presumably for a similar reason. On a number of occasions I've arrived at the pharmacy to find that they've closed, with a note on the door with a number to ring if it's urgent. I sometimes wonder how they could have messed up a perfectly good system quite so spectacularly.

So, for the moment I've reverted to my previous system of collecting paper repeat prescriptions from the GP surgery and physically taking them to a nearby pharmacy and waiting while they are made up.

[quelquod]

Up to around 2 years ago our surgery accepted repeat requests in person, by phone, email or even a form on their website. They’ve all now been discontinued for various reasons - requests lost, emails going astray, switchboard congestion preventing appointment booking so no I have to attend in person and wait in generally a longish line both to request and later to receive the prescription.

I now use Asda instead and they’re remarkably efficient. It beats me why the surgery can accept electronic requests from Asda but not me. Aside from the seemingly generic issues of misplacing either the made up prescription or pharmacist as others have experienced it’s generally an easy 1 week turnaround (3-4 working days really) which coincides with our weekly shop.

[Alaric]

It beats me why the surgery can accept electronic requests from Asda but not me.

Presumably there's no consistency of delivery of repeat prescription request services.

My local GP practice uses a service called "Patient Access"
https://www.patientaccess.com/

This allows on-line requests of repeat prescriptions.

[Nocton]

Our local, rural Lincolnshire, pharmacy does it within two working days from sending the order via the GP web site. In reality I can usually pick up the following day. As far as I know, the GP confirms AOK which is mostly a formality and then it goes direct to the pharmacy. The two days just allows the pharmacy to order the prescription in case they have not got it in, so if it is popular/common the following day is OK.

[redsturgeon]

From Mrs RS who knows stuff...

The best way to make this process much faster is for those with chronic conditions and medication to request that their doctor put them on electronic repeat dispensing. Essentially a batch of Rx sit on the NHS Rx spine, and can be drawn down by the pharmacy without any request needing to go to the GP. Usually 6-12 month's worth. This has added advantage of the patient being able to access a request if they are away or double if going on holiday.

https://wessexahsn.org.uk/projects/120/ ... dispensing

Best kept secret__

[Bminusrob]

I agree that using a pharmacy service for repeat prescriptions is a really good idea. I started using one when my local surgery took in excess of 10 days from delivery of the repeat prescription form to having the prescription ready. Boots did a very good job for me.

However, the downside of this exercise was this: While the Boots repeat prescription service was in place, I was given a further prescription during a GP visit. At the end of the consultation, I dutifully sat in the waiting room for a good hour, waiting to be called to pick up my prescription. When it didn't appear, I went to the counter and asked why there was a delay. The witch behind the counter said, in her best disparaging voice, "Oh, but you don't use our prescription service. You use Boots." I was in quite a lot of pain, in the early stages of cancer. I won't say what I said, but the prescription appeared a couple of minutes later.