Pharmacy First GP IT updates could still be weeks away

IT updates that will allow GPs to update patient records with Pharmacy First consultation details via ‘one click’ will be rolled out ‘in the next few weeks’, NHS England (NHSE) has revealed.

The system was originally due to be live in time for the Pharmacy First launch, which was postponed to 31 January 2024. Then NHSE announced that the systems would be ready from February 2024.

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However, speaking via a live video link at the Sigma conference today, chief pharmaceutical officer (CPhO) for England David Webb, appeared to suggest it would not be ready until next month at the earliest.

He said that community pharmacy Pharmacy First updates displaying clinical pathways and payments were live, but that the updates allowing practice staff to ‘more easily review the pharmacy first consultation outcomes and add the information to the patient record with one click of a button’ were not.

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‘These changes will ultimately be rolled out through GP clinical system suppliers in the next few weeks,’ England CPhO David Webb said.

NHSE had previously suggested that it was not confident IT solutions would be in place for the planned 31 January rollout of Pharmacy First.

NHSE chief information officer John Quinn said in December that the scheme will operate in ‘a complex environment’ with ‘multiple suppliers and a fixed time scale’.

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And chief executive of Community Pharmacy England (CPE) revealed last week that ‘in order to go live [with Pharmacy First] at the date ministers wanted it, we agreed a minimum viable product [for the IT].’