NHS England (NHSE) will keep the scope of services offered through Pharmacy First “under review”, pharmacy minister Stephen Kinnock has said.
Kinnock made the comment in response to a parliamentary question from Conservative MP Luke Evans about the “effectiveness” of Scotland’s Pharmacy First scheme and the “potential merits of expanding a similar service in England”.
Read more: CPE creates website to encourage patients towards Pharmacy First
He said the Department for Health and Social Care (DH) “has not formally assessed the Scottish scheme”, but the design of England’s Pharmacy First service “was informed by best practice from similar locally commissioned services and services commissioned by the devolved governments”.
“NHS England will keep the clinical scope of the service under review,” he added.
Scotland has “broader scope”
Kinnock also acknowledged that the conditions covered by the English and Scottish services “do differ slightly”.
Scotland’s expanded Pharmacy First Plus service “has a broader scope”, he said, and “can be provided by pharmacists with a prescribing qualification”.
“In line with the 10-year health plan, we are committed to giving pharmacists in England more ability to prescribe and to manage a range of health conditions,” he said.
Pharmacy First Scotland, launched in 2020, allows patients to be seen for a wider range of health complaints than England’s Pharmacy First service, which is restricted to just seven conditions.
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Meanwhile, the Independent Pharmacies Association (IPA) last week called for the government to expand Pharmacy First in England.
It said Pharmacy First should “be extended to cover a wider range of common conditions, helping to take further pressure off GP practices and ensuring patients can access the care they need faster, closer to home, and at a time that suits them”.
IPA chief executive Dr Leyla Hannbeck stressed that “if the government is serious about making it easier for patients to get a GP appointment, it needs to invest in community pharmacies, the real front door of the NHS”.
“Now is the moment for ministers to immediately expand the range of common conditions that can be treated on the high street through Pharmacy First,” she added.
Read more: NHS has only ‘dipped its toes’ into Pharmacy First, says CCA chief
It comes after Community Pharmacy England (CPE) announced it had created a website to provide patients with information about Pharmacy First and help them find the nearest pharmacy offering the service they need.
And it follows Company Chemists’ Association (CCA) chief executive Malcolm Harrison urging the NHS to “get on with expanding” the Pharmacy First service.
