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Original poster

Prescriptions - is this normal?

29 replies

TheFuckfaceWhisperer · 21/08/2018 08:00

I’m on iron medicine, have been for a while now due to severe anaemia. This is a repeat prescription so no need to see doctor for one every time. Previously I didn’t pay for my prescriptions and was getting two big bottles every other month. Now, I have to pay and my amount has been halved, so for £8.80 I only got one bottle and have to get another in a month! It seems really unfair and like they’re taking advantage really, when all this time my prescription was for 800mls and now it’s suddenly half that now I have to pay. Is this normal?

OP posts:
endofthelinefinally · 21/08/2018 08:03

Usually repeat prescriptions are for 28 days. I am not sure how/ why you were getting double amounts every 2 months.
Is the medication something you could buy for less OTC?
Have you asked your pharmacist?

AmazingGrace16 · 21/08/2018 08:04

I think you pay per item so they may only be prescribing you one item if you only pay for one?
Medically do you need two?
Did the change coincide with when you started paying? I can't see how the gp would know You have started paying so maybe the actual prescription has changed?
You could ask the pharmacist maybe saying "Oh I used to be prescribed two of these on the same prescription" or check what the prescription says?

AmazingGrace16 · 21/08/2018 08:06

You could also look at paying an annual prescription fee which I believe works out cheaper if you are prescribed something every month.

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General health
Original poster
TheFuckfaceWhisperer · 21/08/2018 08:07

I always thought the pay per item was for individual medications, not by amount of the same item...

OP posts:
funmummy48 · 21/08/2018 08:08

My repeat prescription for HER gives me 3 months supply. Check with your surgery to see if they can go back to giving you two lots per prescription?

funmummy48 · 21/08/2018 08:09

HRT not HER😐

MummySparkle · 21/08/2018 08:10

It depends unfortunately. I'm on 125mcg of levothyroxine (thyroid meds). They don't come as 125 tablets so I have 100mcg and 25mcg on my repeat. I have an exemption card, but if I didn't I'd have to pay twice

TheFairyCaravan · 21/08/2018 08:12

My local PCT will only allow 28 days of any medication to be prescribed at a time. Maybe there’s been a change in policy?

twoheaped · 21/08/2018 08:12

I have had this.
Usually get 56 tabs, last time they gave me 28.
Rang surgery and they said it was to cut down on waste. I pointed out that I'd been on that medication for 6 years and it's not something you can just stop taking, it is detrimental to the heart. I would need to phase down the active ingredient, not just skip a tablet.
I await my next prescription to see if they have put it back up.
As you say, it doubles the cost of the prescription but because it is only one item, getting a passport isn't cost effective.
I am considering changing my GP over this to one who will give me 2 months supply.

Torridon19 · 21/08/2018 08:14

We don't pay for prescriptions in Scotland, so I don't know if your laws in England have tightened up re: sheer amount given at one time. Chemist will know, though......

WrongKindOfFace · 21/08/2018 08:17

If it helps Superdrug pharmacies sell the bottles of 100 ferrous fumerate tablets for under £4. You can also buy them online fairly cheaply. I wasn’t even offered iron on prescription, just told to buy my own as it’s cheaper.

WrongKindOfFace · 21/08/2018 08:17

Wait, no, it’s ferrous sulphate they sell.

MsHomeSlice · 21/08/2018 08:19

this really gets my coat, waste of time and money for everyone.

I mean OBVIOUSLY you cannot go prescribing month's worth of valium or painkillers, but there are plenty of meds that are never going to change...like thyroxine for example. HBP meds are checked every six months, why not do that....same for statins, my mother is forever trailing to the pharmacy for repeats and only getting six month checks

I have to go in and get a month at a time, so that's 12 journeys, 12 scripts, 12 times the pharmacist has to print labels and dole out pills an actually it's 24 journeys as I have to drop the damned thing off and then go pick it up! It's just not efficient for me or the NHS surely.

MsHomeSlice · 21/08/2018 08:20

...gets my goat, not my coat, although with the weather cooling down we will both need our jackets of course. :o

ivykaty44 · 21/08/2018 08:24

I get 56 days supply every 8 weeks on repeat,

Why not look getting a prepayment card sorted, you can pay for it monthly and covers you for prescriptions for a year

MigGril · 21/08/2018 08:24

It'll be as it's charged per item. If they put two on there they would charge you twice. I would look to see if you can buy it though. I have a passport as get 2-3items a month and it makes it cheaper but with one it's not worth it.

I buy my own vitamin D and magnesium yes I need to take both.

ivykaty44 · 21/08/2018 08:28

Mrshomeslice

I get Tesco to do everything for me, I tick the box each time I make one visit every 8 weeks to pick up my medication.

If GP wants to spend time prescribing meds every 8 weeks and pharmacies issue meds that’s there choice.

For me I pick up medication 6 times a year in with my weekly shop and now let everyone else to the running around

MigGril · 21/08/2018 08:29

MsHomeSlice won't your pharmacy deal direct with the GP for repeats. Our pharmacy does it all so all I have to do is go pick it up from them once a month. Means I don't have to trial backwards and forwards to the doctor's.

Doctor's will even send new prescriptions straight to them to. It's not even the pharmacy attached to the doctors it's one local to me.

MsHomeSlice · 21/08/2018 08:35

I live in the frozen north! ....the pharmacy and surgery do liaise, but I have to drop off the order doodah and then go collect.

I may as well live in a cave! :o It's such a malarkey!

PeterPiperPickedSeaShells · 21/08/2018 08:36

I imagine it's to do with wastage. The amount of medications that some patients stockpile is honestly unbelievable - I'm taking dozens of boxes of the same medications, prescribed, dispensed & collected for months & years but not actually taken. Hundreds of thousands of pounds in most cases.
I'm not suggesting that this is what any of the PPs are doing - daily necessary medication is different. But I could honestly weep when thousands of tablets have to be destroyed because of some weird "medication hoarding"

Daisymay2 · 21/08/2018 08:43

Whoever said that 125mcg of levothyroxine would attract 2 script charges was wrong. 2 strengths of the same medicine In the same form is one charge. If one was tablet and the other a capsule then 2 charges. Script charges are a nightmare but the nhs business authority give guidance

SpicePot · 21/08/2018 09:05

daisymay2 I was just about to clarify that exact point. The same drug and form but in two different strengths only attracts one charge.

shaggedthruahedgebackwards · 21/08/2018 09:10

28 days supply of prescription is the norm

However, for items like iron which can be bought over the counter from a Pharmacy without prescription it is worth asking your Pharmacist if it would be cheaper to buy rather than getting on prescription.

starfishmummy · 21/08/2018 09:27

Our local nhs trust has a new central repeat prescriptions system - it's part of a drive to reduce prescription waste, but for the patient is a bit of a nightmare. First harder to get through, its taking longer from ordering to actually getting the medications and that's if the clerk decides it's ok to have the next repeat! Sorting out ahead of my holiday was particularly trying as computer was saying it's too early to re-order!!

ivykaty44 · 21/08/2018 09:46

The costs of gp prescribing I’d rather they gave one script for the year and let pharmacy give me the medication in two month blocks- I’m on my medication for life and it would be cheaper for NHS and same cost for pharmacy