Written by admin on Monday 13th April 2020
Latest news, information and guidance from NHS England and NHS Improvement (NHSE&I) and other bodies for primary care teams (13th April)
Please read the following important updates by clicking the individual accordion boxes below:
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:
PSNC COVID-19 daily updates:
As many of us continue to work into the bank holiday weekend, we wanted to say a huge thank you particularly to those involved in opening services over the bank holiday and identifying the highest risk patients.
The NHS Volunteer Responders service is offering support to pharmacy and general practice 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, for example they can provide regular check-ins for patients feeling isolated as a result of social distancing. Further details on how you can make use of this resource are available here.
Easter opening of pharmacies
Thank you to the pharmacists and their teams that are stepping up to provide vital services to their patients and the public over Easter. Our regional teams have been working with pharmacies locally to be flexible regarding this direction to open whilst ensuring access to pharmaceutical services. We have announced the pharmacies that open will be able to claim a payment of £750 for opening for at least three hours per day on each of 10 and 13 April 2020.
NHS Home Delivery Service
An NHS Home Delivery Service has been commissioned from both community pharmacies and dispensing doctors to ensure delivery of medicines to eligible patients who have been identified as ‘shielded’. More details are in our letter published today.
Patients who meet the ‘shielding’ criteria, are encouraged in the first instance to see if their medicines can be collected from the pharmacy or dispensing practice and delivered by family, friends, a carer or a volunteer. Where this is not possible the patient’s pharmacy or dispensing doctor team will arrange delivery.
Confirming pharmacist status
The Pharmacists’ Defence Association has designed a personalised digital ID card to help pharmacists confirm their status. The card may be of particular use for locum pharmacists who may not be able to obtain an employer stamp or endorsement to use with other documentation. The card can be saved on smartphones or mobile devices or printed off.
Personal Protective Equipment
Updated guidance on Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) was published by Public Health England (PHE) on 2 April 2020. If social distancing of 2 metres from patients attending the pharmacy can be maintained there is no indication for PPE in a pharmacy setting. If this distance cannot be maintained, use of fluid resistant surgical masks (FRSM) is recommended.
Community pharmacies should use the PPE stock that has been delivered to them and when needed order more from their wholesaler. More stocks of fluid resistant surgical masks are being made available to wholesalers to supply to community pharmacies on 9th April 2020. We recognise that some pharmacy staff cannot stay more than 2 metres away from symptomatic people and will need masks. Pharmacy staff working in dispensaries but unable to maintain 2 metres from their work colleagues do not necessarily need to wear masks. It would be extremely helpful, both to protecting longer term supplies to pharmacies and to keeping supplies going to other health professionals, if pharmacies limit the number of staff that have to be within 2 metres of the public to help manage the use of masks and maintain availability.
Temporary closures and changes to pharmacy opening hours on your NHS website profile
With more people using online services due to COVID-19, it is important to keep your NHS website profile up to date and to reflect any temporary closures or changes to your opening hours. Pharmacy profiles editors will receive guidance via email from the NHS website service desk explaining how to do this for both short-term (up to four days) and longer term (five days or more) changes. The step-by-step guide is also available.
Community pharmacy webinar
The recording from last Wednesday's webinar in available to view.
The following update from NPA highlights the key important messages from the numerous Government announcements this week :
Your Questions Answered
