Prescriptions delivered by Mail

[northwest]

I regularly have phone calls with the pharmacist blaming the gp and vice versa

This is an ongoing game they all seem to play 9/10 it is the GP

 

[Robotstar5]

Our doctors are pretty good, log into the GP practice, order prescription and we normally get a text from the chemist the following day saying they're ready for collection, it's only a 10 minute stroll and I need the exercise

 

[James1979]

My local GP surgery is a dispensing practice, you have the consultation and as you leave you can collect the prescription, that's been picked by one dispenser and checked and checked by another.

This was the setup in my old practice. 'They' then built a new hospital. which is actually very good, when they can staff it. Anyhow, 2 of the GP practices then came under the hospital and were provided with space in the main building. Cost saving etc etc. Fine so far..... The procedure now is that the GP issues a prescription (electronically without setting eyes on you if they can get away with it) which gets fired across town to the pharmacy which is where the fun started.

It is verboten to pick up the medicine from the hospital pharmacy which is across the corridor from both practices because it is for hospital patients only! Go figure.....

 

[Robotstar5]

This was the setup in my old practice. 'They' then built a new hospital. which is actually very good, when they can staff it. Anyhow, 2 of the GP practices then came under the hospital and were provided with space in the main building. Cost saving etc etc. Fine so far..... The procedure now is that the GP issues a prescription (electronically without setting eyes on you if they can get away with it) which gets fired across town to the pharmacy which is where the fun started.

It is verboten to pick up the medicine from the hospital pharmacy which is across the corridor from both practices because it is for hospital patients only! Go figure.....

Our local hospital has 2 entrances to the pharmacy, one for collecting medication on discharge, the other for out patients.

On a side note, there is a viewing window for the drug storage which is all automated, you can watch the picking "robot" whizzing round collecting boxes out of racks then dropping them into various delivery chutes to the pharmacists benches for checking and bagging.

 

[badabec]

It is verboten to pick up the medicine from the hospital pharmacy which is across the corridor from both practices because it is for hospital patients only! Go figure.....

Hospital pharmacies, if run by the hospital rather than say a Lloyds pharmacy operating within the hospital, cannot reclaim the VAT that they pay on the medicines. Whereas if the pharmacy is farmed out, that pharmacy can reclaim the VAT.
Standard FP10 prescriptions aren't valid in a hospital pharmacy, similarly prescriptions written from the hospital on their internal prescriptions, aren't valid in retail pharmacies
All standard pharmacies can reclaim the VAT as there is no way of getting the VAT from the patient. The hospitals have to budget for the VAT.

Pharmacists and their lily livered governing bodies have been chasing diminishing returns for years. The dispensing fee is paltry, it was about 55p per item when I retired seven years ago. Companies like Lloyds and Boots rely on vertical integration to make any money, they own the wholesalers they buy from.

When I first started, in 1978, requests for delivery were met with astonishment. Then we started delivering oxygen cylinders, then prescriptions. And arranging prescriptions with the doctors. All because it is piecework.

My objection to postal deliveries from a central pharmacy is who do you talk to if you have a query? Why should your local or any pharmacy sort out your medication queries if you didn't have them dispensed by them? They get the grief and someone else makes the profit.