Discharge Medicines Service (DMS)

Discharge Medicines Service (DMS) is an Essential Service for contractors

The Service:

The Discharge Medicines Service is an essential service (contractual requirement for all community pharmacies) for patients when they leave hospital. It has 3 stages for the community pharmacy to potentially do.

The stages:

Stage

Description of process

Timescale

Who

1 DMS is received by the pharmacy

 

(minimum service level required contractually)

Check clinical information and actions.

Within 72 hrs (3 working days).

Pharmacist

Are there any changes compared to pre-admission?

Pharmacist, Pharmacy Technician

Any issues identified to be raised with the hospital or surgery?

Check for any outstanding prescriptions awaiting collection -are they still appropriate?

2. The first prescription is received

Check medicines prescribed post-discharge take account of the changes made. Any discrepancies, resolve them with the GP practice.

7-28 days post-discharge

Pharmacist,

Pharmacy Technician

3. Check of the patient’s understanding of their new medicines regimen

Check understanding of what medicines they should now be taking/using.

 

Where appropriate, other services can also be provided e.g. New Medicine Service.

First post-discharge prescription

Pharmacist, Pharmacy Technician

 

Claim for service delivery

Submit claim on MYS along with Summary Data.

Monthly on MYS

 

Service Delivery:

DMS is an essential service that is must delivered in timely manner. As pharmacies have an increasing number of clinical service to offer it is critical to involve the whole team where/ when it is possible. Pharmacy Techinicans can support pharmacist in providing DMS. Colleagues have shared their experience in providng DMS in the videos below. Also a useful "DMS Must Do" quick guide with PharmOutcomes screen shots:

Claiming:

The digital interface (API) to facilitate the automatic claim process from PharmOutcomes into the MYS portal for DMS was expected to be ready in early 2024 but has been delayed with no new date communicated yet.

Until then run a report on PharmOutcomes to get the data required for claiming, a guide on how to do is here:

Supporting information

PharmOutcomes training video for DMS:

CPE DMS digital guide:

CPPE:

NHS Toolkit:

Contractors providing the full service will be paid a fee of £35. Where only part of the service can be provided, in certain circumstances defined in the Drug Tariff, contractors will be paid a partial payment. Further details on the payments are on the following CPE website page: 

Further information on the service is available on the following CPE & NHS England and NHS Improvement website pages:

Support Documents

Below, we have produced referenced indexes for all other important Discharge Medicines Service related information, documents, training and resources that we have uploaded into various CPSC news articles published:

- The indexes are automatically created in date order (newest at the top)