Pharmacy First Service

The Pharmacy First service builds on the NHS Community Pharmacist Appointment Service, which has run since October 2019. The consultation service enables patients to be referred into community pharmacy for a minor illness or an urgent repeat medicine supply.

The new Pharmacy First service, adds to the existing appointment service and enables community pharmacies to complete episodes of care for 7 common conditions following defined clinical pathways.

Camberwell Green Surgery offers The Pharmacy First service. This means a trained pharmacist from one of the local pharmacies, such as Fourways Pharmacy, Butterfly Pharmacy or Kembers and Lawrence, will be able to deal with all the minor ailments.

If your symptom is listed under the minor ailments list, you may be referred to the Pharmacy First service. 

If the pharmacist recommends after the consultation that your treatment requires an antibiotic, the pharmacist will contact the GP surgery to arrange the prescription on their behalf and you will be contacted to inform you of when the prescription has been issued to the pharmacy so you can make your way to collect the antibiotics.

If the pharmacist is unable to deal with your minor ailment, the pharmacist will contact the GP surgery to let us know you require a GP appointment. In this instance the GP surgery will contact you to give you an appointment for the following day. You will not have to call the surgery again to make another appointment with the GP.

If you have one of the minor ailments listed below, it is not necessary to call or come to the GP surgery at 8:30am when the phone lines are extremely busy as the Pharmacy First Service is available throughout the day.

Please see the list of minor ailments:

In May 2023, NHS England and the Department of Health and Social Care announced a Delivery plan for recovering access to primary care. Part of the plan includes enabling patients to get certain prescription medications directly from a pharmacy, without a GP appointment.

This new service is expected to free up GP appointments for patients who need them most and will give people quicker and more convenient access to safe and high quality healthcare. It includes the supply of appropriate medicines for 7 common conditions, including earache, sore throat, and urinary tract infections, aiming to address health issues before they get worse.

The following table shows the 7 conditions pharmacists can manage across various age ranges:

Patients will be able to access the 7 clinical pathways element via referrals from referring organisations, including general practice, urgent and emergency care settings, and NHS 111 (online and via telephone). In addition, for the 7 common conditions clinical pathway consultations only, patients can access the service by attending or contacting the pharmacy directly without the need for referral.

Read more about this on the NHS England website