The Welsh government will need evidence of the success of independent prescribers before it can roll out its plans for pharmacists to prescribe to all patients with chronic conditions, the Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) has said.

Government advisory group the Welsh Pharmaceutical Committee (WPC) called for pharmacists to become responsible for "all aspects" of the pharmaceutical care of these patients, including prescribing their medication, in a report on the future of pharmacy in the country published last week (October 15). These prescribing decisions would be made after speaking with patients about their treatment goals and would be "underpinned by evidence-based knowledge", the WPC said in the report, which was supported by the RPS.

But RPS director for Wales Jocelyn Parkes told C+D that this was unlikely to become a reality until independent pharmacist prescribers proved they were improving the lives of patients.

"We need to see how these independent prescribers are making a difference in the amount of encounters that patients have [with them]. It's always about building the evidence. The evidence will then push demand," she said.

There are currently 188 independent prescribers in Wales according to the GPhC and Ms Parkes said there needed to be more. The RPS had always supported increasing the numbers of prescribing pharmacists and there were "a lot more services they could be doing", she stressed.

RPS president Ash Soni told C+D that he wanted to see a move towards independent prescribing not just in Wales but across the UK. Encouraging pharmacists to become prescribers for patients with long-term conditions would support effective patient care and take pressure off GPs, who should be supporting patients with more complex needs, he said.

Community Pharmacy Wales chairman Chris James said that while more independent prescribers in Wales could be beneficial "in the right setting", the government would first need to ensure funding was available. "At the moment there are no budgets to prescribe anyway, so that is something which would have to be looked at," he told C+D.

Welsh locum pharmacist Richard Schmidt told C+D that although it was "feasible" for Welsh pharmacists to become independent prescribers, he was "uncomfortable" with the idea that they should automatically be given prescribing powers. Pharmacists would need to have "a lot of training" before they could take on a prescribing position, as it did "not necessarilly make you an authority on particular diseases".

The WPC's report also called for pharmacists to visit patients with "supported living needs" in their homes and create pharmaceutical care plans to monitor patients' medicines.

In its response to NHS England's Call to Action consultation earlier this year, the RPS said the government should support all pharmacists to become independent prescribers.

Last year, the Scottish government unveiled plans for all Scottish pharmacists to become independent prescribers by 2023.

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