England: Community Pharmacist Consultation Service (CPCS) NPA resources – are you prepared?

24 Oct 2019

Community Pharmacist Consultation Service (CPCS) NPA resources

The NHS Community Pharmacist Consultation Service (CPCS), which goes live on Tuesday 29 October 2019, introduces an expanded clinical role for local pharmacists and offers faster access to care for patients, allowing “same-day” consultation with a pharmacist, either by telephone or face-to-face, for minor illnesses or urgent medicines supply by calling NHS 111.

Community Pharmacist Consultation Service (CPCS)

NHS England & NHS Improvement (NHSE&I) has produced an Advanced Service Specification and CPCS toolkit for pharmacy staff; pharmacy contractors who wish to provide CPCS must ensure they, and relevant (appropriately trained) members of the pharmacy team, have fully read and understood the content of both of these documents prior to providing the service.

CPCS pack launched

To support our members in implementing this key service, we are pleased to announce the launch of the CPCS pack containing the following resources to support members in delivering the service:

  • CPCS: Key points
  • CPCS: Urgent medicine supply
    • Standard operating procedure (SOP)
    • Legal requirements
    • Practical guidance
  • CPCS: Minor illness/low acuity
    • Red flag factsheets – cough, fever in children, sore throat
    • Sepsis overview

Coming soon

NPA support: resources and webinars

The NPA has produced a number of resources to support its members to safely and effectively deliver CPCS. Furthermore, all of our resources to support members in delivering the requirements of the new Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework (CPCF), including the CPCS and the Pharmacy Quality Scheme (PQS) can be accessed here.

You can also access a series of webinars to support deliver of the new CPCF requirements, including one focusing on emergency supply regulations, here.

 For further information please contact the NPA Pharmacy Services team on 01727 891800 or email at:  pharmacyservices@npa.co.uk.