As part of the response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the NHS Business Services Authority (BSA) are advising and supporting primary care in England to increase the use of Electronic Repeat Dispensing (eRD), a system using the power of the Electronic Prescription Service (EPS) to allow patients taking ‘stable’ medicines to receive a repeat prescription for up to a year. Eligible patients can confirm a repeat prescription online and go straight to their pharmacist to collect their prescription, avoiding an extra trip to the GP practice.
eRD is recognised to have benefits for patients, General Practice and Community Pharmacy. Whilst providing benefits as part of the COVID-19 response, the system-wide benefits are sustainable beyond the current pandemic response:
- A simplified, secure, reliable service for GP practices, pharmacies and patients.
- Reduces workload for prescribers allowing better prioritisation of resources.
- Supports social distancing by reducing footfall to the GP practice to order repeat prescriptions.
- Controlled management of the supply chain, reducing the number of temporarily unavailable medicines.
- Improves the data captured from prescriptions, to enable better reporting and improved medicines optimisation.
- Effective eRD can save up to 46 minutes a day of GP time, and if 80% of all repeats were issued as repeat dispensing, 2.7 million GP hours could be saved.
Watch our webinars
Working with the South West AHSN, we hosted a webinar series that aimed to share local and regional experience to help support you in your area of work. You’ll find recordings of recent sessions below.
Watch our webinar from 25 June 2020 on the benefits of eRD based on experience from GP and CCG colleagues:
View slides here: SW and WoE AHSN eRD Webinar part 1
Watch our webinar from 2 July 2020 on using eRD to drive effective care planning:
View slides here: SW and WoE AHSN eRD Webinar part 2
Watch our webinar from 8 July 2020 on eRD, system collaboration and eRD care homes:
View slides here: SW and WoE AHSN eRD Webinar part 3
Our fourth webinar held on 16 July: The benefits of eRD based on experience from GP and CCG colleagues was a repeat of the topics covered in the first webinar.
Our final webinar in this series (held on 23 July) discussed eRD and community pharmacy. Please see the slides here: WM, SW and WoE AHSN eRD Webinar part 5- SLIDES
Resources
Video resources
- ‘Patient video explaining eRD’ (3 mins)
- ‘Video outlining the process’ (3 mins)
- ‘Managing Repeats’ (1 min)
- ‘Time Savings’ (50 sec)
- ‘Making the Most of eRD’ (56 sec)
- ‘Considerations to make’ (1:57 mins)
- ‘Making Changes’ (57 sec)
- ‘Cancellations’ (30 sec)
- ‘Prescriber Benefits’ (1:06 mins)
- ‘General Advice’ (2:34 mins)
- ‘Setting up eRD in EMIS’ (3:36 mins)
- ‘Wessex eRD in Response to COVID-19’ Webinar (1:15 hours)
- ‘eRD SystmOne’ Webinar (52 mins)
Resources for Promoting eRD to Patients
- eRD Information for Patients’ NHS BSA
- ‘eRD Poster for Patients’ Wessex AHSN
- ‘eRD Patient Leaflet’ NHS BSA (order hard copies here)
- ‘Waiting Room Slides’ NHS BSA
- ‘COVID-19 Patient Letter Template’
- ‘COVID-19 Patient Email Template’
- ‘COVID-19 Patient Text Message Template’
- ‘COVID-19 Suggested Social Media Content’
Resources for GP Practices
- ‘eRD Information for GP Practices’ NHS BSA
- ‘eRD set-up guide for SystmOne’ Doncaster CCG
- ‘eRD e-learning course’ North East Commissioning Support
- ‘Benefits of eRD’ NHS BSA
- ‘eRD Patient Suitability Guide’ NHS BSA
- ‘eRD Cancelling a Prescription’ NHS BSA
- ‘eRD Pathway Guide’ NHS BSA
- ‘eRD Handbook’ Wessex AHSN/NHS BSA
- ‘Guide on Accessing EPS Utilisation Dashboard’ NHS BSA
- ‘Explaining eRD to a Patient Crib sheet’ Dorset CCG
- ‘COVID-19 eRD Quick Start Guide’ North Central London CCG
- ‘COVID-19 eRD Guidance for GP Practices’ North Central London CCG
- ‘Myth Busters: reducing barriers to implementation’ Wessex AHSN
- ‘NCL COVID-19 Electronic Repeat Dispensing Guidance for GP’
- NCL COVID-19 Electronic Repeat Dispensing Quick Start Guide – April 2020
- Update on changes to the GP contracts – October 2020
Resources for Community Pharmacies
- ‘eRD Pathway Guide’ NHS BSA
- ‘eRD Handbook’ Wessex AHSN/NHS BSA
- ‘Electronic prescription tracker guide’ NHSA BSA
- ‘Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee (PSNC) eRD Page’ PSNC
- ‘SOP for repeat dispensing’ National Pharmacy Association
- ‘eRD e-learning pack’ Centre for Postgraduate Phamracy Education (CPPE)
- ‘Dispenser Quick Guide’ NHS Digital
