NHS Reform Listening Exercise – Have Your say

The BMA is encouraging members to feed their views on the future shape of the NHS in England into the government’s ‘listening exercise’. You can complete a structured feedback form, on this new hub page, that will inform the BMA submission to the NHS Future Forum, due to be sent in the end of the month. The BMA are also using the page to inform members of how they can input their views to the Future Forum via the DH, and will be hosting a web-chat on the website on the evening of Monday 16 May, with members of the Future Forum taking part. You should have received this letter from Laurence Buckman last week encouraging you to put forward your views.

NHS Availability of Antivirals for Flu, Changes to Regulations

There has been some changes to the regulations regarding NHS availability of antivirals for flu, adding a new category of patient, to allow GPs to prescribe antiviral treatments on the NHS for patients not in one of the designated “at clinical risk” groups, but who are at risk of developing complications from flu. Therefore, oseltamivir and zanamivir may, in certain circumstances, be ordered for those who are under 65 years of age, who are not pregnant, nor considered to be at clinical risk, but who are considered to be at risk of developing complications from the symptoms of influenza.

The NHS (General Medical Services Contracts)(Prescription of Drugs etc.) (Amendment) Regulations 2011 came into force on 20 April and details of these are also published in Part XVIIIB of the Drug Tariff.

Fitness To Drive Guidance

GPC has received some queries regarding the status of changes to the rules regarding driving and diabetes. There appears to have been some confusion because in February 2011 the DVLA published a revised version of their “At a glance guide to the current medical standards of fitness to drive” at the same time as they published the Department of Transport’s consultation on UK driving licence standards. The ‘At a glance’ document contained some changes from the August 2010 version. These included changing the categories for diabetes “managed by tablets” and accommodating additional criteria for Group 1 and 2 drivers such as, the requirement that the person “must not have had more than one episode of hypoglycaemia requiring the assistance of another person within the preceding 12 months”.

Ethnicity and First Language Recording Guidance

The Ethnicity and First Language DES was withdrawn on 1 April 2011, because it was intended as a two-year catch up to enable practices to record ethnicity and first language for patients already on their list, and following the third year extension for 2010-11, this has now ceased. Despite the withdrawal of this DES, it is expected that practices would want to continue to record their patients’ first language and ethnicity as a matter of routine in order to assess the needs of their population. This guidance highlights the published codes for ethnicity and first language so that practices can continue to record this data.

Changes to the ABPI Code of Practice

The BMA has joined 16 other organisations in a joint statement supporting two key changes to the Association of British Pharmaceutical Industries (ABPI) Code of Practice which was published in March 2011. From 1st May 2011, the pharmaceutical industry will no longer be allowed to provide branded promotional aids, such as pens, pads and mugs, to healthcare professionals. From 2012, companies will be required to collect and declare on an annual basis aggregate total amounts paid to health professionals and others for certain services such as speaker fees and participation in advisory boards. Similarly companies will be required to declare sponsorship for attendance at meetings organised by third parties. The first declaration of payments will be in 2013 for payments made in 2012. The Code does not require individual health professionals to be named but does require the total number of health professionals involved to be declared and the total number of meeting attendances sponsored.