Community pharmacists and their teams are doing their best during these difficult times to make sure that everyone gets the medicines they need. We have today received the following advice from the Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) to help them to help you:
- Follow Government advice and do not visit a pharmacy if you or anyone in your household has a temperature or a new and continuous cough, even if mild.
- Plan ahead where possible. Pharmacies are working hard to provide prescriptions, but please try to order your next prescription seven days before it is due. This will help the pharmacist deal with urgent requests and queries.
- If you are handing in your prescription, please put your contact details on it so pharmacies can let you know when your medicines are ready. That means you won’t need to be in the pharmacy for as long. Please don’t ring the pharmacy unless it’s urgent.
- If you are self-isolating please ask family, friends or neighbours to arrange to pick up your medication for you. If you don’t have anyone who can collect your medicine, speak to your community pharmacy for advice about how they can help.
- If you are well and can visit the pharmacy yourself, think about how you can help family, friends and neighbours who are self-isolating by collecting their medicines on their behalf (you may need to take ID with you and will need to know the name and address of the person you are collecting for).
- Do not ask for extra medicine or an increase in prescription duration as this could lead to overall medicines shortages. Continue to request as normal and do not stockpile.
You can find further information from the RPS here.