Services Database Urgent Medicines During Normal Working Hours (Bath and North East Somerset (BANES) Area)

The service aims to ensure prompt access to specialist urgent medicines during working hours through participating pharmacies. The pharmacy agrees to hold a specified list of urgent medicines and ensures they are in date, ready for supply against a valid prescription. These medicines include palliative care medicines and others considered urgent such as oral Vitamin K for patients at high risk of bleeding, high dose Vitamin D, and antivirals at the beginning of the flu season. Reimbursement for any urgent care medicines that go out of date because usage is so low can be claimed on a monthly basis, and a record must be kept by the pharmacy.
Referral to participating pharmacies is through GPs, nurses and other pharmacies via a phone call to inform the pharmacy that they will soon be receiving a prescription for a medicine on the urgent list.

The pharmacist will maintain their competency in the area of palliative care medicines – this may include utilising the Learning at Lunch scenarios from CPPE and undertaking the CPPE session on palliative care drugs.