Top headlines
NHS recommissions ill-fated pharmacy flu scheme
Practices to be offered £16k to persuade GPs to stay in general practice
GPC funding body supports judicial review against CQC inspections
15:00 Sporting organisations are being encouraged to co-locate with GP surgeries in order to receive funding from Sport England, according to the Sport Management website.
The quango’s property director Charles Johnson said that it will emphasise the importance of building community hubs which merge health and fitness facilities with everyday amenities, and echoed previous comments by its chief executive highlighting the successes of having GP surgeries in leisure centres.
12:20 An NHS trust has been fined £180,000 after sending an email to almost 800 patients with HIV without blind copying the recipients email addresses.
The 56 Dean Street clinic in London sent out a newsletter in 2015 which revealed the email addresses of patients with HIV, the BBC reports.
At the time, the clinic’s consultant Dr Alan McOwan said: ’We screwed up on this one.’
11:15 Staying on pharmacists, if you missed it, we report that NHS England has recommissioned the pharmacy flu scheme. Read the full story here.
9:30 The Times reported over the weekend that Boots are set to offer in-store skin cancer and diabetes checks for patients.
Marc Donovan, the company’s chief pharmacist, told The Times: ’I would call for minor ailment schemes in community pharmacies. Why would we insist that someone with a minor ailment go to a GP surgery? And, building on that, the management of chronic conditions like diabetes can be done in the community pharmacy.
’There’s nothing after diagnosis that can’t be done by one of our pharmacists. Patients want it … and I think the NHS needs it.”
However, the GPC warned that creating competition between pharmacists and GPs would be detrimental.
Dr Richard Vautrey, deputy chair of the GPC, said: ’GPs welcome the opportunity to work with pharmacists collaboratively but they have concerns when there becomes a degree of competition between the two. We need to be careful that we’re not promoting pharmacies in a way that ends up with patients having to pay for things they would otherwise get free on the NHS.’
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