Prescription For Child Denied - Told to spend £20

[SuperFluity]

Hello, new joiner here! My GP has just assessed my DD as needing Cetirizine and Piriton day and night for the next two weeks to deal with an allergic reaction.

I was told I had to pay for the medicine myself and the GP would not provide a prescription. I said that would need 4 bottles of medication to cover the period and cost £20 and that we should not be expected to pay £20.

I absolutely understand that prescribing aspirin and paracetamol should be banned. But what do you all think about the situation above? Is this normal? Am I being unreasonable to expect a prescription in this instance?

Thank you!

Those who are mentioning schools - the actual guidance for schools does not say anything about it needing to be prescribed for them to give.

Infact even if it is prescribed schools don’t have to give medication.

Those pharmacy minor ailment schemes are run by area/CCG - ours doesn’t do it, so not everyone has access to them.

I think it’s time of people to realise the NHS is a finite resource with limitations. You need to get used to paying for some meds yourself.

I should have also mentioned that the eye drops of prescription level weren't needed.

Yeah, I should have realised that given the context of your really good post. My bad.

Dentists - not free for everyone and even then not everything is covered. Braces for kids are hard to get on the nhs for starters.
Education - schools ask for lots of contributions. I remember being in school and all the equipment baring pe and uniform was provided. Now however, we have to provide this. Same with books at gcse level.
Opticians - again not all free outside the nhs range.

@Isleepinahedgefund I think it’s time of people to realise the NHS is a finite resource with limitations. You need to get used to paying for some meds yourself.

Ah yes, like CCGs denying type 1 unstable, brittle, diabetics access to a sensor. Diabetics who have a considerable amount of hypoglycaemic coma per month. Many of these diabetics are severely disabled as a result, spend a considerable amount of time in bed, suffer considerable neuropathic pain and are unable to work and reliant on benefits. Yet they are expected to pay £120 a month for a sensor that significantly enhances their quality of life.....

IME you don't need to provide schools with prescriptions, especially for OTC items like Piriton. I gave school a bottle to give to DD during the summer months as and when needed. If she was streaming they gave it to her.

IME I had to fill in a three page medical form, plus provide a prescription bottle of, essentially, piriton otherwise they wouldn't give it to her. She wasn't allowed to take meds in and take them herself either.

So there we go. Schools vary.

I think you’ve been very poorly advised if you have been sold premium name drugs when generic ones are identical.

But if people stopped demanding stuff they could cheaply buy otc and wasting nhs resources, then there would be money to buy the sensors or whatever it is people genuinely need to improve their quality of life.

I love the NHS. I just wish that others would give it the respect that it deserves. To understand that it's broke and these people are just adding to the strain. If we continue as we are, £20 will be a drop in the ocean if we lose this service.

But if people stopped demanding stuff they could cheaply buy otc and wasting nhs resources, then there would be money to buy the sensors or whatever it is people genuinely need to improve their quality of life. This!

@theworldistoosmall they are all free. Uniform needs to be bought yes but everything else is free unless you choose to allow them to go on trips abroad etc. Their education is free. You do not pay tuition. Schools in a lot of areas are stretched to their limits yet education is free for all regardless of income. Dentist is free. All necessary work done for the child is free. I don't see any of these people offering to pay the £14 or whatever it is for a check up to ease the strain on the NHS for their child because they can get it for free. Glasses are free. Eye operations free. If they 100% believe parents are responsible for costs of their children then they should pay for everything not just pick and choose a price range that suits them.

But if people stopped demanding stuff they could cheaply buy otc and wasting nhs resources, then there would be money to buy the sensors or whatever it is people genuinely need to improve their quality of life.

Nailed it. The key word here for me though is "cheaply". Brilliant post.

My DS nursery point blank refused to give him his antihistamine without a precsription. I’d rather pay for it- but what else can I do! He needs the antihistamine as without it his asthma flares.

His prescription costs a fuck of a lot less than his regular hospitalisation did, before we worked out the routine of medication to keep his asthma under control.

It saves the taxpayer and public purse a fuck of a lot less to pay for his prescription than it would to pay me universal credit if I lost my job (as I almost did) due to the extraordinary amount of time off I needed to care for him before we got this under control.

So I let the doctor make out the prescription, and we cost the nhs x amount per prescription- but it saves thousands, literally, for the NHS and DWP.

So what’s the right thing there?

FYI the antihistamine in this case is Cetirizine hydrochloride solution, and he is a toddler, so tiny dose.

So schools provide all cooking ingredients, books, stationery, folders, pens etc?
Not in my experience. Plus all the pta fundraisers to raise funds for various pieces of equipment - sports, playground, etc.
The requests for donations of equipment - art stuff etc.
Not all trips are abroad and provide something educational that's fun.

I see the money I spend in the school in the same was I do otc. Yes in an ideal world everything should be free. But that's fantasy. Reality is I would rather pay for otc or send cash to the school so that they can actually spend on things vitally needed. And the more funding is cut in education the more our financial involvement will increase. We need to start getting used to it now or unless they are given funds instead of cuts, we will lose them.

Not everything is free on the NHS.

Are you in Scotland? A pharmacy can provide this for child via minor ailment scheme at no cost. I think also available to adults in receipt of benefits .

@theworldistoosmall my daughter is only in primary school so I don't know about secondary school but when she started years ago she was provided with a book bag, 2 plain paged books one for numbers and one for letters and a pencil. I didn't pay for them. She is given weekly reading books provided by the school , they take them on trips to the library and she has a teacher and a teaching assistant in the classroom everyday. They get free school meals until year 3. Education is free. You don't pay personally for that teacher to teach your child like you would in university. You do not pay thousands a year for your child to get an education. Donations are just that. Donations. They are a choice. Yes you do pay more for uniform now than you used to but until you personally pay a teacher or school a tuition fee of thousands of pounds a year as you might a private tutor or an adult would for university their education is free.

To be clear I agree that otc medication that is only a couple of quid should be bought by the parents and that people need to stop going to the hospital and gp for nothing. But ppl need to realise that this country does have its privileges and if they believe the responsibility lies with the parents to pay for the child then they need to realise just how much they actually get for their child and how much they would end up paying out if they had to pay for these things. Can you imagine the amount of children who wouldn't be able to attend school if you had pay tuition?

One of my kids takes loratidine year round. It has to be specifically loratidine in liquid form. Thie cheapest I can do this is for about £15 a month. My area has stopped prescribing OTC drugs too. When the receptionist told me this I questioned whether everyone would be able to afford that. They've done his repeat prescriptions without questions ever since, but that wasn't really my point. I pay for antihistamine for my other child as it's not year round and the medical need is not the same, cetizirine works for her and I can get it cheaply. I don't think you were BU, it depends what you need the medication for and how much it costs.

@potatoscone what you are saying makes no sense. You can prescribe something and make people pay for it, so why are children's prescriptions free? It's to ensure that children get the drugs they need regardless of affordability. Many GPs know that some families can not afford or may not prioritise the drugs their children need even if they are available OTC. I have received (without requesting) kids paracetamol and ibuprofen from A&E when that was what my kid needed for acute croup (along with steroids).

Those saying that schools won't administer medication without a GP prescription.

This is really frustrating. It's school policy not legislation and GPs should be putting their foot down. Schools don't get to make health policy!

This also applies to schools deciding they need Drs letters as evidence of pupils sickness absence. School policy which affects access to GP appts.

what you are saying makes no sense. You can prescribe something and make people pay for it, so why are children's prescriptions free? It's to ensure that children get the drugs they need regardless of affordability.

Indeed. But I'm talking about prescription medication. Not OTC stuff.

If you rock up with medication for your child that isn’t prescribed you have no idea when the child last had it, if they are allergic to it, if mum and dad have different ideas on medication (it happens! - dad won’t give medication on ‘his turn’)

It’s not something schools should have to get involved with and quite rightly refuse

And people wonder why the nhs is in the mess it is. My son has to have aspirin. It is £1 for 100 tablets, he has to have 1/2 a tablet a day. When it was first prescribed he was prescribed 14 tablets to last the month. That would have been charged at £22 to the nhs. I told the pharmacist not to dispense it and I would buy some. They refused to sell it too me as it was for a child under 16. I just went to another chemist and purchased some and have done ever since. I always refuse a prescription for calpol/nurofen/piriton as these are so much cheaper to buy than what the nhs is charged. It's crazy!

No it's not nonsense love! Isn't it £20.70 child benefit a week?

And you can't spare a few quid? You need to budget better