Report attached.

Mark Trenfield, Public Health Intelligence Analyst, Shropshire Council

Jess Edwards, Business Intelligence and Insight Manager, Shropshire Council

The Board received the report of the Public Health Intelligence Analyst which set out the Draft Pharmaceutical Needs Assessment (PNA).  He explained that under the Health Act 2009, all Health and Wellbeing Boards had a statutory duty to produce a PNA and the last one that was done was in 2022, so the next one was due to be published by 1 October 2025 following a 60-day public consultation. 

The Public Health Intelligence Analyst drew attention to the contents page that showed the areas he had looked at so far.  He informed the Board that there were 17 GP dispensing practices and 43 community pharmacies operating in Shropshire, with the dispensing practices tending to be more rural whilst the community pharmacies tended to congregate around the main towns.

There were four less community pharmacies in Shropshire than when the last PNA was done, resulting in more people per community pharmacy in Shropshire than in England.  This impact was slightly reduced when including dispensing GP practices but still above the level for England.  He then looked at the 9 essential services that all community pharmacies offered along with the advanced and additional services that they could choose to offer.  Accessibility and whether residents could get to a community pharmacy in Shropshire within 10 minutes in a car, via public transport or on foot was also considered.  The full PNA also looked at the level of activity and number of items dispensed over 12 months and the number of pharmacies that had signed up for the advanced and additional services.

The Public Health Intelligence Analyst took Board members through some of the responses from both the resident and the contractor survey before summing up.  If approved by the Board, a 60-day public consultation would then be undertaken before the PNS was published.

The Chair thanked the Public Health Intelligence Analyst for the level of detail contained within the PNS and how it linked back into what it actually meant for communities.

A query was raised about whether there was a pharmaceutical co-ordinating body for Shropshire, and if so, what level of engagement did they have in the provision of comprehensive services particularly in evenings, weekends and overnight and whether SATH had been involved in any of these discussions as they would have pharmacy services which were available in principle for a 24-hour period.

In response, the Public Health Intelligence Analyst explained that as part of the PNA Steering Group, he had worked with Peter Prokopa from Community Pharmacy in Shropshire Group and James Milner who worked with the ICB on pharmacy provision who had had quite a lot of input into this piece of work.  However, the hospitals had not been involved because they offered a different level of service than would be expected from a community pharmacy.  Concern was raised that as there was no 24-hour provision, some residents and patients may not be able to wait and may end up at the urgent and emergency care centres and a query was raised as to whether a potential solution had been looked at with regard to the availability of pharmacies throughout Shropshire.

In response, the Director of Strategy & Partnerships SATH and Chief Strategy Officer NHS STW (ICB) explained that the ICB’s Chief Pharmacist worked with pharmacy leads and it was for him to look at what the opportunities were within the next phase.  He queried the level of variances in activity and wondered whether this was due to greater need or possibly greater take up.

The Director of Partnerships, NHS Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin reported that the Local Pharmaceutical Committee for Shropshire had also linked into this work.  She clarified that hospitals had no payment mechanism for dispensing FP10 prescriptions.  She went on to explain that the PNA was used to determine what services were required in the County, so should they want 24-hour pharmacies, they should be inviting applications for potentially new services should that be a requirement.

A brief discussion ensued in relation to the challenges of access especially in the more rural areas of the County however, the Chair felt that with the publication of the 10-year plan, there was the opportunity to really think about what neighbourhood working meant when you had rural populations especially for the viability of those businesses.

RESOLVED:

To note the contents of the presentation and report and to agree that the PNA can go out for the statutory 60-day public consultation.