Pharmacy prescriptions plan needs investment, says Southampton GP

NHS England's plan to use high street pharmacies for some common prescription drugs and routine tests needs the right investment, says a Southampton GP.

Preshan Jeevaratnam, GP partner at the Living Well Partnership, made the comments after a visit from Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Tuesday.

Mr Sunak earlier welcomed the plan, saying it would allow patients to get their medication "quickly and easily".

Dr Jeevaratnam cautioned he was "not sure the infrastructure is there".

Mr Sunak was born in Southampton in 1980, where his father was a GP and his mother ran a pharmacy.

"I think he was pleased to be back here in Southampton and he made several references about his time here," Dr Jeevaratnam told the BBC.

But the Hampshire GP warned the health service needed investment "and we need it in the right places".

He explained: "At the moment we have blood pressure machines in our waiting room which link in with our clinical systems and can flag a clinical response - I think there will need to be some investment to make sure similar systems are in place in other pharmacies."

"There's a lot of things we deal with in primary care that could be dealt with in a well-resourced pharmacy setting - that's the key, well-resourced," he said.

Using technology that links automatic blood pressure machines to a pharmacy's clinical system rather than pharmacists spending their time actually taking blood pressures "is probably the best way forward", the GP added.

He said investing in primary care could have a "real impact elsewhere in the health service", adding: "There's a lot we can do in general practice if we were resourced to do it - and not only deliver high quality but it's also cost effective for the public purse.

"I'm all for a well-resourced local pharmacy being able to deal with things like minor ailments that they can prescribe for and that will certainly help our workloads."

Mr Sunak also paid a visit to the pharmacy his mother used to run, where he spoke to staff, including pharmacist Jithender Ballepu.

Mr Ballepu told the BBC: "Pharmacists are already doing a lot more for a lot less.

"It's good to know that he's giving more funding but it's important that they [the government] recognise the amount of work that pharmacists are already doing.

"There's a whole team behind the pharmacist and the team is not supported enough - it's just minimum wage even though you need specialist skills and they need to recognise that."