South West Community Pharmacy Information

This webpage is for Community Pharmacists and their teams based in Bath and North East Somerset, Bristol, Cornwall & Isles of Scilly, Devon, Dorset, Gloucestershire, North Somerset, Somerset, South Gloucestershire, Swindon and Wiltshire.

Further details and opening times of pharmacies are available on the NHS website. You can also find South West Bank Holiday maps and opening hours on our website.

All public and patient enquiries, complaints and Freedom of Information Act requests should be directed to england.contactus@nhs.net or telephone 0300 311 22 33.

If you are from a Community Pharmacy in Bath and North East Somerset, Bristol, Cornwall & Isles of Scilly, Devon, Dorset, Gloucestershire, North Somerset, Somerset, South Gloucestershire, Swindon or Wiltshire and have a query, please email us at england.pharmacysouthwest@nhs.net

Changes to Core or Supplementary Hours

Pharmacy owners who wish to change their supplementary opening hours are required by their terms of service to notify our team. If a pharmacy owner wants to:

  • increase supplementary opening hours at the pharmacy, a notification of the change must be given in advance of the increase but there is no notice period.
  • decrease supplementary opening hours at the pharmacy, at least five weeks’ notice must be given prior to implementing the change.

Pharmacy owners have no right to change core opening hours but must apply for any changes. Applications to change core opening hours may be granted or refused. The application will be considered and determined within 60 days, and any changes, if approved, may be implemented only after 30 days (from the date approval). The success of an application will depend on many factors, and a pharmacy owner should ensure sufficient evidence is provided to support the reasons for the changes.

The Community Pharmacy England website has additional information for changing supplementary and core opening hours.

All notification and application forms can be found here.

Clinical Waste Services for Pharmacies

NHS England has an agreement in place with the following providers:

BaNES, Swindon & Wiltshire
Stericycle (SRCL)
Telephone: 0333 2404400
Email: supportuk@stericycle.com
Website: www.stericycle.co.uk/

Bristol, North Somerset & South Gloucestershire
Tradebe
Telephone: 0845 603 2893
Email: uk.healthcare-customerservice@tradebe.com
Website: www.tradebe.co.uk/

Cornwall & IOS
Peake (GB) Ltd
Telephone: 01579 342212
Email: du.peake@btconnect.com
Website: www.peake-gb.co.uk/clinical-waste/

Devon
PHS
Telephone: 029 2085 1000
Email: rosebristow@phs.co.uk
Website: www.phs.co.uk/

Dorset
Stericycle (SRCL)
Telephone: 0333 2404400
Email: supportuk@stericycle.com
Website: www.stericycle.co.uk/

Gloucestershire
Tradebe
Telephone: 0845 603 2893
Email: uk.healthcare-customerservice@tradebe.com
Website: www.tradebe.co.uk/

Somerset
Stericycle (SRCL)
Telephone: 0333 2404400
Email: supportuk@stericycle.com
Website: www.stericycle.co.uk/

Or

PHS
Telephone: 029 2085 1000
Email: rosebristow@phs.co.uk
Website: www.phs.co.uk/

Contact Details

Email: england.pharmacysouthwest@nhs.net

Contact for Controlled Drugs

Please remember to report any controlled drug incidents or concerns to the Controlled Drug Accountable Officer. For controlled drug general queries please email england.southwestcontrolleddrugs@nhs.net

Visit our Controlled Drugs page for more information.

Guidance Resources

Forged prescription guidance

Clinical Reporting (COVID-19 Vaccination Sites Only)

 Specialist Medicines Enhanced Service

Links to the Pharmaceutical Needs Assessments (PNAs)

Links to your Community Pharmacy Local (CPL) Committee

 

Market Entry Applications and Changes of Director and/or Superintendent Pharmacist

Pharmacies planning a Change of Ownership, to relocate premises, consolidate existing premises or open a new pharmacy under The National Health Service (Pharmaceutical and Local Pharmaceutical Services) Regulations 2013 must apply to NHS South West Collaborative Commissioning Hub. The Regulations can be found here:  The National Health Service (Pharmaceutical and Local Pharmaceutical Services) Regulations 2013 (legislation.gov.uk). To apply, please access the Pharmacy Market Management Services (PMMS) through the Primary Care Support England (PCSE) portal.  The relevant application forms are on the website and there is guidance on signing up to the portal and completing and submitting the forms.

Where a pharmacy body corporate appoints a new director or superintendent, or a DAC body corporate appoints a new director, it must notify the NHS South West Collaborative Commissioning Hub within 30 days (paragraph 32(4), Schedule 4 and paragraph 22(4), Schedule 5 of the Regulations). The Regulations can be found here: The National Health Service (Pharmaceutical and Local Pharmaceutical Services) Regulations 2013 (legislation.gov.uk). To do this, please access the Pharmacy Market Management Services (PMMS) through the Primary Care Support England (PCSE) portal and complete and submit the relevant forms. There is guidance on the process on the website.

Market Exit

Where a contractor wishes to withdraw from a pharmaceutical list (Market Exit) they are required to give notice of the proposed pharmacy closure to the NHS South West Collaborative Commissioning Hub:

  • Pharmacies with 40 core opening hours – at least three months,
  • Pharmacies with 100 core opening hours – at least six months,
  • Pharmacies with more than 40 core opening hours where a direction is in place – at least three months,
  • Dispensing appliance contractors – at least three months

The relevant form can be found here and should be sent to england.pharmacysouthwest@nhs.net

NHS Complaints Procedure

If you have a complaint about primary care services for GPs, dentists, opticians or pharmacy services please contact:

NHS Mail Shared E-Mail Accounts

All community pharmacies and DAC organisations must be set up with a shared NHS mailbox. This mailbox is separate to your personal mailbox and can be accessed by multiple members of staff. All staff who have access to the shared mailbox can send emails ‘on behalf’ of the mailbox.

NHS Mail accounts are available to community pharmacies to support the secure exchange of patient or sensitive data with other health and social care professionals.  If you have not already applied for your site specific shared e-mail account, please use the following link for information on how to arrange set up: https://support.nhs.net/article-categories/joining-nhsmail/.  If you have any problems using the NHS Mail system you can direct queries to: pharmacyadmin@nhs.net

There have been some amendments in the process for adding additional users to a shared NHS mailbox.

Where there are UNDER 10 users already assigned to a shared mailbox

New staff member(s) will need to have a personal NHSmail account to enable them to have access to the pharmacy shared mailbox. If the pharmacy has less than 10 user accounts assigned to the shared mailbox, the shared mailbox owner will need to raise a request with the pharmacy national helpdesk, (from the shared NHSmail account) emailing pharmacyadmin@nhs.net asking for the personal account to be created. The request will need to include:

  • Pharmacy team members complete name,
  • alternate email address
  • their mobile phone number (as the password will be sent by a text message)
  • confirm if their account will be linked to the shared mailbox and if the account will be an owner or member

Where there are OVER 10 users already assigned to a shared mailbox

If the pharmacy’s shared NHS mailbox has more than 10 users already assigned and require extra new users (personal accounts) to be added, all requests need to be completed on the Additional User Account blank spreadsheet and emailed to england.pharmacysouthwest@nhs.net for authorisation. Once authorised the NHS England South West Community Pharmacy Team will forward the request to the pharmacy national helpdesk for processing.

The NHSMail guide for Organisations provides information/guidance on

  • What to do if you are moving to another organisation
  • What to do when ownership of a community pharmacy changes

NHS UK: Your Profile Page

NHS UK is the primary public facing website of the NHS. It provides comprehensive and trusted health information to help people make the most of their health and get the best out of the healthcare system. The pages include directories of local health services. The site also shows comparative data about healthcare providers, to help people make informed choices about their healthcare. This includes feedback on all NHS services.

If a patient logs onto the website, they will be able to find a profile for each NHS contract. They will also find a Patient Feedback page where they can leave a comment and a rating on their experiences at your pharmacy. It is good practice to acknowledge and respond to comments; your editing rights will include the option to set up permissions for members of your staff to respond to feedback posted to your profile.

If you have any queries, please contact the NHS UK service desk. General support is also available through the Community Pharmacy England (CPE).

The NHS South West Collaborative Commissioning Hub does expect the site to reflect the current service provision so that patients can access the most up to date information. Please ensure that any changes to your profile adhere to any regulatory requirements around proposed changes to opening hours, to include lunch breaks and bank holidays. The NHS South West Collaborative Commissioning Hub will be doing audits around this.

NHS Prescription Services

The NHS Business Services Authority (BSA) NHS Prescription Services, provides prescribing, dispensing and payment information for dispensing contractors.

NHS Prescription Services produces the monthly Drug Tariff on behalf of the Department of Health and Social Care. You can view the Drug Tariff on-line.

PCSE Supplies / Stationary

Your NHS South West Collaborative Commissioning Hub supplies should be ordered through PCSE Online.

Reporting Significant Incidents or Concerns

NHS England has launched a new national online service to record patient safety events and to help us learn from things that go wrong in healthcare. Learn From Patient Safety Events (LFPSE) is replacing the National Reporting Learning System (NRLS) and all healthcare staff in England, including those working in primary care services, are encouraged to use the system to record any events where:

  • a patient was harmed, or could have been harmed
  • there has been a poor outcome but it is not yet clear whether an incident contributed or not
  • risks to patient safety in the future have been identified
  • good care has been delivered that could be learned from to improve patient safety

The LFPSE reporting system can be accessed here and more details on the LFPSE service can be found on NHS England’s website.

Serious Difficulty Application

Patients can apply to the NHS South West Collaborative Commissioning Hub to have their prescriptions dispensed by their GP due to serious difficulty in obtaining them from a pharmacy. Please complete the below form if you wish to apply.

Temporary Suspension of Service

What you should do in the event of a temporary suspension of service.

In accordance with the regulations, contractors must notify the commissioner of any temporary suspension as soon as practical.

The Terms of Service require NHS community pharmacy owners to have a business continuity plan for temporary suspensions due to illness or other reason beyond their control and to action the plan when necessary.

For any temporary suspension in service the contractor should use all reasonable endeavours to implement their business continuity plan, this should include as a minimum the following:

  • Notification sent to the Commissioner by reporting the temporary suspension of service (29D of Schedule 4 (2)(a) via one of the following ways:
  • Name of Contractor, address, ODS code and contact details provided.
  • Date(s) of the temporary suspension of service and its anticipated duration (29D of Schedule 4, 2(a(ii))
  • Times at which pharmaceutical services were not provided. (29D of Schedule 4, 2(a(ii))
  • Reason for temporary suspension of service (29D of Schedule 4, 2(a(ii))
  • Confirmation the pharmacy has updated their directory of services (DoS) profiles via Profile Manager to show the temporary suspension of services. (29D of Schedule 4, 2(b))
  • How has the pharmacy made arrangements for ensuring that patients are not referred to the pharmacy premises for directed urgent care services during the temporary suspension where practicable? (29D of Schedule 4, 2(c))
  • How has the pharmacy made arrangements for notifying other pharmaceutical service providers and GP practices about the suspension, and its anticipated duration, where practicable? (29D of Schedule 4, 2(d))
  • How has the pharmacy made arrangements for displaying the necessary information to patients about the suspension, and its anticipated duration, in the approved manner, so that it is visible from outside the pharmacy (or for DSPs made the necessary changes to their website). (29D of Schedule 4, 2(e)). A template to display the necessary information can be found at the end of this section.
  • Where practicable and safe to do so the Commissioner’s expectation is staff remain on the premises to signpost patients and for any prescriptions to be put back on the spine where appropriate. Focusing on support to patients and neighbours.
  • How has the pharmacy made arrangements for the continuity of patient care including for those patients with booked appointments or those attending the pharmacy regularly for the supervised administration of medicines? (29D of Schedule 4, 2(f)). This relates to informing the local drug and alcohol service to arrange alternative provision (including supervised administration).
  • How has the pharmacy used all reasonable endeavours to implement its business continuity plan?

South West Community Pharmacy Local Policy for Temporary Suspension of Service

The South West Community Pharmacy Local Policy for Temporary Suspension of Service sets out the approach the South West Pharmaceutical Services Regulations Committee (SW PSRC) and the commissioner takes in the monitoring of and using contractual sanctions in relation to temporary suspension of services in Community Pharmacy across the ICBs.

The Commissioner recognises the wider community pharmacy network are bearing the impact in areas where there are consistently high volumes of temporary suspensions in service.   The policy is intended to provide support to those affected by the impact of these closures by ensuring contractors act responsibly and fulfil their contractual obligations to support their patients.  Hence, resulting in improved access for patients and a stabilised service provision.

The local policy describes a set of principles for community pharmacy to follow in managing Temporary Suspensions, including implementing their business continuity plan and demonstrating they have used all reasonable endeavours to resume the provision of services. The local policy sets out the approach the South West Pharmaceutical Services Regulations Committee (SW PSRC) and the Commissioner takes when monitoring and using contractual sanctions in relation to temporary suspension of services in Community Pharmacy across the 7 South West ICBs. This includes breach notices and financial withholdings based on the number of breaches.

Additional Resources

Translation & Interpretation Services for NHS Patients

Interpretation and Translation Services information can be found on our website.

 

South West Pharmacy Bulletins 2024-25