COVID-19: This week's updates for community pharmacies

Written by admin on Thursday 9th April 2020

Latest news, information and guidance from NHS England and NHS Improvement (NHSE&I) for primary care teams (9th April)

 

Please read the following important updates by clicking the individual accordion boxes below:

COVID-19: 7th April round-up for primary care

The 7th April saw the launch of the NHS Volunteer Responders service where over 750,000 people have volunteered their time to drive patients to appointments, collect medicines from pharmacies and making regular phone calls to check on people isolating at home. We strongly encourage all of you to make full early use of the volunteer responders for your patients. Further details on how you can make use of this resource are available here. 

Below we have outlined arrangement for the forthcoming Bank holiday weekend. We are sorry to be sending this information so close the bank holiday weekend but hope the details below will help you to finalise your arrangements.

On personal protective equipment:

  • Work continues to increase distribution of PPE equipment, with a further nationally coordinated push of supplies this week for GPs, pharmacy and urgent dental services.
  • Additional PPE equipment has also been released to established wholesalers to ensure primary care can get hold of supplies through business as usual routes.
  • Over 30 million items of PPE are being delivered across Local Resilience Forums in England and will provide further support in maintaining access to supplies at a local community level, including GPs.
  •  Any primary care providers who continue to experience problems getting hold of PPE equipment, who are in need of urgent or emergency supplies can still contact the NSDR.  
  • We continue to keep arrangements under review to ensure all healthcare providers who have a clinical need for PPE are able to access the necessary equipment.

Bank holiday preparations – access to primary care services

COVID-19 demands are anticipated to be at their highest so far in many areas, with increasing care needs for our population and impact on staff. We have previously asked for primary care to align with the rest of the NHS, and to treat the Easter bank holiday as a normal working day. This will be no normal weekend, as you will have anticipated. Local Resilience Forums (LRFs) are working to maximise capacity right across the system. Thank you in advance for your support.

The changes for general practice also naturally impact community pharmacy as it is important patients have confidence in their ability to access pharmaceutical services on these days. We are requiring pharmacies in England to open from 2pm to 5pm on 10 April 2020 and 13 April 2020.

Any pharmacy that was planning to open longer hours should still to do so to support access for patients through the day.  Where pharmacies had been directed to open by regional teams (RT) as part of the Easter planning activity before the COVID-19 pandemic these arrangements and payment stand unless agreed otherwise between the contractor and NHSE&I regional team.

The NHS England and NHS Improvement regional office should be contacted if:

  • a pharmacy is unable to open for reasons beyond the control of the contractor
  •  the pharmacy wishes to seek exemption from the requirement to open e.g. if a pharmacy is in an area where there is minimal demand due to the Government’s social distancing policy (e.g. large shopping malls)
  • there are circumstances where it makes more sense for local communities if the opening hours are outside of 2-5pm.

NHS England and NHS Improvement regional teams will consider exceptions and the local flexibility needed based on the needs of patients in the areas served and in view of the challenges for pharmacy staff. Contact details of NHS England and NHS improvement regional pharmacy commissioning teams can be found at:  https://www.england.nhs.uk/primary-care/pharmacy/pharmacy-contract-teams/  

Pharmacy 111 DoS profiles have been updated to reflect the 2-5pm opening hours.  Pharmacies with different opening hours or pharmacies that are closed should ensure their NHS 111 DoS Profiles entries reflect their opening hours over the bank holiday weekend.   (DoS Profile Updater is available at https://dos-profile.service.nhs.uk and the emergency change number is 0300 0200 363). 

To support patient access pharmacies will also need to ensure their NHS Website entries reflect their opening hours.

Financial arrangements
Pharmacy contractors will be able to claim a payment for opening for directed hours. The detail of this payment is being negotiated with the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee. 

PSNC is working with the Department of Health and Social Care and NHS England and NHS Improvement to provide as much support and guidance as possible to help community pharmacy teams contribute to some of the many challenges that could arise in an epidemic situation.


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PSNC are now publishing daily COVID-19 updates by email to all those that have authorised this news stream feed.

Please find below links for this week's updates which cover the following topics:

  • Chloroquine & Hydroxychloroquine update
  • EPS nomination changes via NHS App
  • Good Friday & Easter Monday funding (£250 per hour negotiated)
  • Good Friday & Easter Monday opening
  • Health & Justice support
  • Legitimate Movement letter
  • Media & Parliamentary work
  • Minister writes open letter to pharmacy
  • NHSE&I Community Pharmacy webinar
  • Pandemic Medicines Delivery Service updates
  • PPE latest
  • PSNC webinar for contractors - Wednesday 15th April 7.30pm
  • Vulnerable patient flag added to SCR
  • Volunteers training (free)

PSNC COVID-19 daily updates: