Tag: Parliamentary Question

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Virendra Sharma on 2015-11-13.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what estimate he has made of the number of GP appointments and A&E visits each year for self-treatable conditions which could have been treated at home or with advice from a pharmacist; and if he will make a statement.

Alistair Burt

NHS England’s Urgent and Emergency Care Review Phase 1 report (November 2013) estimated that 20% of general practitioner (GP) consultations relate to minor ailments which could largely be dealt with by self-care and support from community pharmacies.

More recently, the NHS Alliance’s report, Making Time in General Practice (October 2015), found that around a sixth of patients covered by the study could potentially have been seen by someone else in the wider primary care team, such as clinical pharmacists, practice nurses or physician assistants, or by being supported to meet their own health needs.

On 16 November 2015, the GP Workforce 10 Point Plan partners announced the pilots taking part in its new scheme to fund, recruit and employ clinical pharmacists in GP surgeries as part of efforts to promote new ways of working, improve patient access and reduce GP workload. NHS England has more than doubled funding from £15 million to £31 million for its clinical pharmacists in general practice pilot, this will be shared between the 73 successful applications which cover 698 GP practices and include 403 clinical pharmacists.

The Department does not collate data nationally showing how many people who visit accident and emergency (A&E) departments could have been treated elsewhere. As part of the implementation stage of the urgent and emergency care review, NHS England is piloting the national ED (emergency department) pharmacy initiative. The pilot will show the potential for pharmacists to work alongside A&E staff as part of a joined-up, multidisciplinary workforce, to help ensure people with urgent care needs get the right advice in the right place, first time.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Virendra Sharma on 2016-05-18.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether the UK would lose access to the Prüm Convention in the event of a vote to leave the EU.

James Brokenshire

As set out in the Government’s White Paper on the process for withdrawing from the European Union, published on 29 February 2016, the rules for exiting the EU are set out in Article 50 of the Treaty on the European Union. The process that would be followed is unprecedented – no country has ever used Article 50. It would be a complex negotiation involving all 27 remaining EU Member States and the Commission.

Should the UK leave the EU, future collaboration in relation to the relevant EU Prüm measures would depend on the outcome of the negotiation. Two non-EU countries (Norway and Iceland) have concluded an agreement to access Prüm, although both are part of the border-free Schengen area. The agreements were concluded in 2010, but neither agreement has yet entered into force.