23 January 2012
MUR guidance published
The NHS Employers organisation and the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee have published a guidance document for Medicines Use Reviews (MURs), which includes an explanation of the October 2011 changes to the service.
This new guidance will be a useful resource for commissioners of community pharmacy, pharmacy contractors and individual pharmacists. It includes information on the conditions of the service, how to deliver it successfully, monitoring arrangements, an updated MUR service specification, as well as a list of suggested questions which pharmacists can use during the MUR consultation with patients.
13 January 2012
Guidance for community and hospital pharmacists
NHS Employers and PSNC have published new guidance showing how the New Medicine Service (NMS) and post discharge Medicines Use Reviews (MURs) can be used to provide a seamless care pathway for patients who transfer from hospital to the community setting. Hospitals and community pharmacists can use the support tools to formalise how they tell each other about changes to patients' prescriptions. Click here to download the documents.
2 November 2011
The first advanced service for community pharmacies introduced in April 2005 was the medicines use review (MUR) and prescription intervention service. The underlying purpose of the service is, with the patient’s agreement, to improve the patient’s knowledge and use of their drugs.
The regulatory framework for the service is contained within the Pharmaceutical Services (Advanced and Enhanced Services) (England) Directions 2011 (DH Gateway reference 16660) and this is supported by a service specification which was agreed by NHS Employers and PSNC. Please note that this document is due to be updated in light of the changes to the service that came in from 1 October 2011.
From 1 October 2011 50% of MUR service consultations must be undertaken on patients who fall within one of the national target groups. Currently these groups are:
• Patients taking a high risk medicine
• Patients recently discharged from hospital who had changes made to the drugs they are taking whilst in hospital
• Patients prescribed a respiratory drug included in certain BNF subsections.
Further details of the relevant BNF subsections can be found in the Directions.
Details of the payments that will be made to contractors by NHS Prescription Services on behalf of PCTs can be found in the Drug Tariff.
One of the three conditions that pharmacy contractors must meet before starting to provide the service is that they have an ‘acceptable location’. PSNC has developed a form that contractors may use when declaring that they have an acceptable location. Please note the use of this form is not mandatory.
Where a pharmacy contractor wishes to provide the service at premises other than their own or over the telephone, then they must first seek the PCT’s approval. PSNC has developed a form for this purpose. As above the use of this form is not mandatory.
Patients are required to consent to both receive the service and to allow the community pharmacy to share information from the MUR service consultation with other parts of the NHS. The wording that must be used in the patient consent form is now available (DH Gateway reference 16660). NHS Employers and PSNC have released a template leaflet that contractors may find useful when explaining the service and its benefits to patients. Use of this template is not mandatory.
Pharmacy contractors providing the service are required to prepare a written record of each MUR service consultation that is carried out and to keep that record for at least two years. The Secretary of State for Health has approved the data that is to be recorded and the form that is to be used (DH Gateway reference 16660). Copies of the record must be provided to certain people in accordance with the time limits advised in “Guidance on the provision of MUR Service Consultation Record” (DH Gateway reference 8612).
Pharmacy contractors are required to provide certain approved data to their PCT where requested to do so. This data is to be provided electronically using the national reporting template (DH Gateway reference 16660). PCC has produced a template letter that PCTs may wish to use when requesting information from pharmacy contractors providing the MUR service.