This pile of medication – worth hundreds of pounds and returned to a South Holland GPs’ surgery – demonstrates a big financial problem facing the NHS.
We reported on October 20 about Lincolnshire Clinical Commissioning Group’s plan to save £13.5million a year by stopping prescriptions for minor ailments for medicines which are available over the counter, such as painkillers and antihistamine.
A packet of paracetamol which can be as cheap as 25p in a supermarket costs CCGs £2.50 because the NHS pays for the medication and the cost of dispensing it.
The medications in the photo were returned to the surgery for incinerations, which is the proper course of action for items not required. Unfortunately, even unopened items cannot be reissued to other patients.
A spokesman for the surgery said: “This stash of medication had been stockpiled and was brought in for us to dispose of. This was just from one household of two people, and there is more to come.
“All the drugs have to be securely disposed of by being put into the bins shown at the back of the picture and sent for incineration.
“There is hundreds of pounds worth of medication shown in just this one batch – all completely wasted as they cannot be reissued to another patient. We receive several batches like this a year.”
One of the ways in which this type of stockpile is built up is by pharmarcies auto-ordering a repeat prescription list when a patient does not necessarily need every item.
The spokesman added: “Patients can help by letting the pharmacy know if there are any medications they do not need if they already have some at home.
“We would like all patients to be mindful of only ordering those medications that they need, rather than stockpiling them at home.”
Public consultation on all of Lincolnshire CCG’s proposals – which include restricting the prescription of gluten-free products, baby milk and nutritional supplements – continues until Friday, November 18. The online survey is at www.southlincolnshireccg.nhs.uk
