Prescriptions Information.

Please note that this practice follows the Lancashire Medicines Management Group’s Guidelines for Good Prescribing in Primary Care to help reduce waste within the NHS.

What is a REPEAT Prescription?

Repeat prescriptions are medications which appear on the right hand side of your prescription, which your doctor would like you to continue on a regular basis

What is an ACUTE Prescription?

Acute prescriptions are medications which do not appear on your Repeat prescription slip and are issued as a one-off (such as antibiotics) or when you have been started on a new medication that will need a review to check it is working for you.

How to order a Prescription

Online

We strongly encourage all our patients to use the NHS APP – this will have all details of your repeat medication and when they are due to be repeated. Your personal information is also more protected using this method.

This is the quickest and safest way to request your medication.

You can also use the App to change your Pharmacy Nomination

Email

FROM 31/12/2024 WE WILL NO LONGER ACCEPT REQUESTS FOR PRESCRIPTIONS VIA EMAIL

We strongly suggest that you download the NHS App to order your medication. Setting up and using the app is as easy as setting up and using the Facebook app. If you need help you can contact reception.

In Surgery

You can visit the Practice and place a prescriptions order slip in the post box at our reception.

We do not accept orders for medication over the phone, our Reception team will direct you to order in one of the ways mentioned above. This is the same for all patients.

Emergency Prescription Requests

Emergency prescription requests are requests for medication which you have run out of and that you need, to prevent you becoming severely unwell.

Emergency medications may include;

  • Antiepileptic medication
  • Insulin
  • Treatments for Anaphylaxis

Emergency prescription requests cannot be used for medication which has been ordered late. You should allow 2 working days for routine repeat prescription requests. Please respect our staff, as it is your responsibility to ensure that your repeat prescription request is ordered in plenty of time.

Newton Drive Health Centre Policy

Due to the increasing numbers of patients requesting their prescription on an urgent basis, the practice has needed to instate an Urgent Prescription Policy.

Please take the time to read the following policy and Information, you can then order your medication in the most appropriate way.

Requests for prescriptions outside the normal prescription protocol impacts significantly on both doctors and administration staff time as well as increasing the risk of a medication prescribing error.

Unless a medication is clinically urgent, requests will be processed routinely (over 2 working days). The member of staff you speak to will be able to advise you if your medication can be ordered urgently.

Urgent prescription requests are not requests for medication which have been ordered late as it is the patient’s responsibility to ensure that repeat prescription requests are ordered in time.

Please respect our staff

  • Our reception and administrative staff will always follow this policy and they are not authorised to make any exceptions.
  • Staff are not allowed to interrupt the on call GP during surgery.
  • This policy is put in place to protect our patients and our staff, and we will not tolerate any abuse to or of our staff as they are following policy.
  • Abuse of staff in relation to this, or any other, policy may result in you being removed from the Practice list.
  • Urgent requests are only authorised for emergency medications that are needed within 24 hours to prevent the patient from becoming seriously ill.
  • You can contact 111 out of hours to access a prescription out of hours if you really need to.

Many medications can safely be missed for a few days.

Further information

Hospital Prescriptions

  • When you are seen at the hospital and given a hospital prescription, you should not leave the hospital without first visiting the hospital pharmacy to collect the medication. Enough should have been provided to you for one month.
  • You cannot ‘redeem’ a Hospital Prescription in a community pharmacy
  • Do not bring the Hospital Prescription to the surgery and ask us to convert it to a Practice Prescription – some hospital medications are not licenced to be prescribed by General Practitioners and we need to wait for correspondence from your Consultant to determine if we can issue the medication for you.

Private Prescriptions

  • A Private Prescription is usually issued to you after you have been seen by a Private Doctor or Consultant – you will have paid to see them at a private hospital or clinic, either yourself or via private health insurance.
  • Please do not bring a private prescription to the surgery and ask us to convert it to an NHS prescription as we will not do this.
  • You will need to take the private prescription to a local pharmacy and pay for the prescribed items directly.

A private prescription may be issued to your by your GP and the following would apply:

  • A GP in the surgery at which you are registered can only provide a private prescription if the medication is not available on the NHS.
  • A private prescription is not written on an official NHS prescription and so is not paid for by the NHS.
  • The cost of a private prescription is met wholly by the patient, the Doctor issuing this may charge you for writing the prescription and the Pharmacy will then charge for the medication and the dispensing of it.
  • A prescription is a legal document for which the doctor, who has issued and signed it, is responsible.
  • A doctor you see privately can’t issue an NHS prescription.

Holiday Medication

  • Holiday are usually booked weeks or months in advance, therefore, when you are preparing for your holiday please remember to submit an early request for your medication, detailing the dates you are going and coming back, and allow the usual 2 working days for processing.
  • we can only provide a maximum of 3 months medication and we may request a patient provides documents to support the request.
  • we are unable to provide emergency prescriptions for holiday medication.

New Patient Prescriptions

  • We recommend that you get a good supply of your regular medication from your previous GP before registering with us.
  • If you normally take regular repeat medication please let us know by giving us a copy of your repeat prescription slip.
  • We will check your medication list and put them on the repeats list and if necessary we will book you a New Patient Health Check, please make sure to put your availability on your registration form.
  • We recommend downloading the NHS app as an easy and convenient way to order your medications.

Why does it take 2 working days to process a repeat prescription request?

  • Here at Newton Drive, our Prescriptions team process prescriptions requests every day.
  • Our prescription team has to check your medical records to ensure that your medication request is on your repeat prescription and is due to be ordered.
  • The request then goes to our Clinical Pharmacist or Doctor to authorise and ensure that it is still appropriate for you to take.
  • Once authorised, your prescription will be sent electronically to your pharmacy of choice.
  • Delays may occur if any medication requested is not on your repeat prescription list or if your medication request differs from what is on your list. Your doctor may also request that you make an appointment to have your medication reviewed.

Prescribing Wisely

Many medicines and products that can be bought over the counter without a prescription

  • The NHS is under pressure. Our budgets are not large enough to pay for all the treatments we would like to purchase.
  • We would like to spend less on medicines you can buy without a prescription so as to free up funds for other valuable NHS services.
  • Our Practice will no longer routinely prescribe medicines which are available to buy over the counter in pharmacies (and, in the case of some medicines, in supermarkets and other shops too).

Requesting your repeat prescriptions

  • We ask that you – the patient – or a carer or family member order the medications you need, when you need them.
  • A lot of medicines are wasted – dispensed but not used.  We believe that some of this waste can be reduced if people request their repeat prescriptions directly from their general practice, rather than allowing a community pharmacy to request prescriptions on their behalf. Nobody knows which medicines you are really running out of better than you.

Non-Repeat Prescriptions

How to order a non-repeat prescription

  • Non-repeat prescriptions are also know as ‘Acute’ Prescriptions.
  • This means the medication was issued as a one off to treat a short term problem or is a new medication to you and will need to be reviewed to check that it is working for you.
  • If you have an on-going problem and would like another prescription of a medication previously prescribed to you by the doctor (but not on your repeat list) you may request another prescription here. Please let us know the reason for your request and a contact number, in order for the doctor to review your request.

Acute medication requests may take up to 2 working days to process and the doctor or pharmacy team may wish to speak with you about your request.

Prescription Costs

Visit NHS Choices for information on:

  • Prescription charges
  • Who is entitled for free prescriptions
  • Medical exemptions (certain diseases will exempt you from paying for your prescription)
  • Free prescriptions for cancer patients, renal dialysis patients and pregnant women
  • Help for those on low income.

For information on a Prescription Prepayment Certificate please click here.

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