COMMUNITY PHARMACY BUILDS ON SUCCESS
CPNI Chief Executive, Gerard Greene, tells PiF why the new commissioning plan for 2021/2022 is richly deserved…
T
he contribution of NI’s community pharmacy during the pandemic has been recognised in a new commissioning plan
for the forthcoming year.
On 19 April, the Health Minister, Robin Swann, announced that the Department of Health (DoH), working closely with the Health and Social Care Board (HSCB) and Community Pharmacy Northern Ireland (CPNI), had reached agreement on a commissioning plan for community pharmacy services for the year ahead.
‘Community pharmacies have been playing a pivotal role in delivering health services to communities in Northern Ireland during the pandemic,’ the Health Minister said, ‘and it is clear that there is a very high level of public confidence in the professionalism and dedication shown by community pharmacies during what has been an extremely challenging year.
‘I am very pleased to give my support to a community pharmacy commissioning plan for 2021-22, which builds on the agreement reached on last year and provides a coherent structure for the provision of community pharmacy services over the next twelve months.’
Closely aligned with the health needs of local communities and the HSC, the focus in this year’s commissioning plan will be on provision of accessible services for the safe supply and use of medicines, activities to promote good physical and mental health, vaccination services, first point of contact for advice and treatment of common illnesses and support for patients in care homes and those receiving end-of-life care. Perhaps unsurprisingly, news of the commissioning plan has been warmly welcomed across the board.
‘No-one in community pharmacy needs to be told just how difficult the last year has been,’ CPNI Chief Executive, Gerard Greene told PiF.
‘Community pharmacy became front and centre in the primary care response to COVID-19. The world of community pharmacy changed overnight, forcing teams into a sustained, intensive, and fast-moving period of adaptation during the evolving pandemic. At the outset CPNI, HSCB and DoH (NI) set about supporting pharmacy teams on the grounds,
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pharmacyinfocus.com
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