Benefit status checks

30 December 2014: The Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) spoke to a number of news outlets following moves from the Department of Health to make pharmacists in England check the benefits status of patients collecting free medicines from their pharmacy if they don’t have their exemption certificate with them.

The RPS spoke to national broadcast media including the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, BBC Radio 5 Live, and a number of national newspapers including The Times, The Independent, the Daily Mail and the Daily Express.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4, RPS spokesperson Neal Patel said: “The sharp end of practice, where pharmacists actually have conversations with patients, does interplay with this issue. We want those conversations to be about [patients] getting the most out of their medicines; we don’t want those questions to be about checking up on people’s benefits.”

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Citation
The Pharmaceutical Journal, PJ, 24 January 2015, Vol 294, No 7846;294(7846):DOI:10.1211/PJ.2015.20067549

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