Dear Colleague,
The final update of concessionary prices for August 2020 have been released and are as follows:
| Drug | Pack Size | Concessionary Price |
| Senna 7.5mg/5ml oral solution sugar free | 500ml | £10.61 |
| Valsartan 80mg capsules | 28 | £11.32 |
| Valsartan 160mg capsules | 28 | £15.69 |
| Zonisamide 100mg capsules | 56 | £43.96 |
The full list of concessionary prices can be found on our website www.communitypharmacyni.co.uk
Kind regards,
Katherine
SENT FOR AND BEHALF OF KATHERINE KIDD | Head of Pharmacy Development
Dear Colleague,
Further concessionary prices have been granted for August 2020:
| Drug | Pack Size | Concessionary Price |
| Alendronic acid 10mg tablets | 28 | £5.75 |
| Clonidine 25microgram tablets | 112 | £16.11 |
| Entacapone 200mg tablets | 30 | £10.33 |
| Erythromycin 250mg gastro-resistant tablets | 28 | £4.11 |
| Esomeprazole 40mg gastro-resistant capsules | 28 | £4.59 |
| Hydroxyzine 10mg tablets | 84 | £1.75 |
| Moxonidine 300microgram tablets | 28 | £8.74 |
| Nizatidine 150mg capsules | 30 | £7.47 |
| Olanzapine 10mg tablets | 28 | £4.23 |
| Prednisolone 20mg tablets | 30 | £7.19 |
| Rasagiline 1mg tablets | 28 | £20.41 |
| Tacrolimus 0.1% ointment | 30 | £24.95 |
| Tacrolimus 0.1% ointment | 60 | £46.64 |
| Valproic acid 150mg gastro-resistant capsules | 100 | £11.37 |
| Valproic acid 300mg gastro-resistant capsules | 100 | £22.77 |
| Valproic acid 500mg gastro-resistant capsules | 100 | £30.00 |
Kind regards,
Katherine
SENT FOR AND BEHALF OF KATHERINE KIDD | Head of Pharmacy Development
Dear Colleague
Please find attached for your attention, correspondence from Joe Brogan, Assistant Director of Integrated Care, Head of Pharmacy and Medicines Management.
The attached letter provides further details of the Community Pharmacy Home Delivery Service which is being commissioned by HSCB from Tuesday 1st September 2020. The service will remain in place until a date specified by HSCB. In the first instance it will run until 31st March 2021.
The aim of this service is to ensure that eligible patients during the COVID-19 pandemic who do not have a family member, friend or carer or volunteer who can collect and deliver their prescription medicines on their behalf, can have their medicines delivered in a manner which keeps both them and pharmacy staff safe from COVID-19.
In line with DoH policy, patient eligibility is defined as those patients who are deemed to be clinically extremely vulnerable should they become infected with the COVID-19 virus. The full list of eligible patient groups is set out at Annex A of the attached service specification.
ACTION REQUIRED
If you have a query about this service, please contact your local HSCB Pharmacy Adviser or the CPNI office.
Yours sincerely
SENT FOR AND BEHALF OF GERARD GREENE | Chief Executive
Dear Colleague
Please find attached for your attention, correspondence from Joe Brogan, Assistant Director of Integrated Care, Head of Pharmacy and Medicines Management.
HSCB, DOH and CPNI have been working to establish which pharmaceutical services may be safely reintroduced. It has been agreed that community pharmacies may recommence the provision of the Minor Ailments Service from Tuesday 1st September 2020.
The ongoing pandemic may, however, affect the ability of some pharmacies to safely deliver this service in its current format. Therefore, some flexibility in how pharmacies can deliver this service has been agreed and is outlined in the attached letter.
ACTION REQUIRED
If you have any query about this service, please contact your local HSCB Pharmacy Adviser or the CPNI Office.
Yours sincerely
SENT FOR AND BEHALF OF GERARD GREENE | Chief Executive
As at 28 August 2020 – Sent to Contractors who have not Responded
*** R E M I N D E R ***
Sent: 25 August 2020 09:38 URGENT REMINDER Sent: 20 August 2020 16:33
Subject: HSCNI Secure Email
Dear Colleague,
We are following up with pharmacies who have not, as yet, responded to the test email sent by your local HSCB office on 19th March 2020. We have attached the relevant correspondence relating to this and a copy of the test email is provided below.
Subject: HSCB Test Email & Communication Policy – Please Respond
Dear Colleague,
This is a test email issued via the HSCB to both provide you with a copy of the Primary Care Email Communication Policy and test access to your HSC Secure Email for the first time.
Please read the attached Primary Care Email Communications Policy and respond to this email confirming receipt and agreement with the policy. Once your response to this
email confirming agreement with the communications policy has been received, the HSCB will be in a position to commence email communications with your pharmacy
(all communications issued via email will also be issued via hard copy post for a period of time).
If there is anything you would like to discuss in relation to the HSC secure email for community pharmacies or the attached communications policy, please contact your local Practice
Support Manager in the first instance. If you can access this email and are content with the attached communications policy, simply reply to this email address confirming receipt
and acceptance of the communications policy. The HSCB will then commence email communications with your pharmacy using your HSC secure email address (with information
additionally being issued via hard copy post for a limited period of time).
We appreciate this came at an extremely busy time for community pharmacy and are also aware that some technical difficulties have been experienced, we hope these issues have now been resolved.
The use of secure email will be particularly important to support services from September onwards, including the new HSC commissioned flu vaccination service, it will also form a critically important means of communication within a potential COVID-19 second wave.
We would strongly encourage you to take steps to get connected by responding to the test email sent by HSCB on 19th March 2020 as soon as possible.
If you are having any difficulties please contact your local HSCB office to get these addressed.
Yours sincerely
SENT FOR AND BEHALF OF GERARD GREENE | Chief Executive
Dear Colleague,
I write to provide you with some further information on recent Community Pharmacy funding allocations, on ongoing progress being made with HSCB-DoH(NI) and an outline of which funding elements will be included in the payment BSO will release to Contractors later this week.
The funding allocations are summarised below. Any funding being released by BSO and paid to Contractors on 28th August 2020 is marked in red below.
CPNI continues to work with colleagues in the HSCB and DoH(NI) on the detail associated with the various elements and, as you will see, a number of aspects are still to be finalised. You will receive further correspondence from HSCB on these aspects in due course.
I also wish to advise you that in addition to the £13.25m funding announced by Robin Swann, Minister for Health on 1st July 2020, Mr Joe Brogan (HSCB) has also confirmed that business case approvals have been received for funding totalling £4m, linked to Medicines Adherence services within Community Pharmacy in 2020/21.
Summary Service & Payment information:-
£13.25m Community Pharmacy Funding.
£4m Medicines Adherence services within Community Pharmacy
This provision of the funding, commencing later this week and through out the rest of 2020/21, is positive and I hope it assists you as you plan for the provision of services to patients during the remainder of 2020/21.
Please do not hesitate to contact CPNI offices if you require any additional information.
Yours sincerely
SENT FOR AND BEHALF OF GERARD GREENE | Chief Executive
