Prescription Drugs availability

jordanbasset said:
But even if they know when you return after your summer away you will be counted as residents again
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There is a waiting period to re-establish ordinarily resident. I had to visit the local eye hospital on my return from Portugal earlier this year and the Dr. ran through the usual questions about age, address and "have you been resident in the country for the last 3 months?" When we were discussing a follow up visit, I had to tell him I wouldn't be around for several months so couldn't make an appointment. Nice chap said he wouldn't note that as it could get me kicked out of the system, just to come back and phone them if any more problems.
 
Graham376 said:
There is a waiting period to re-establish ordinarily resident. I had to visit the local eye hospital on my return from Portugal earlier this year and the Dr. ran through the usual questions about age, address and "have you been resident in the country for the last 3 months?" When we were discussing a follow up visit, I had to tell him I wouldn't be around for several months so couldn't make an appointment. Nice chap said he wouldn't note that as it could get me kicked out of the system, just to come back and phone them if any more problems.
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Does not apply to general practice. Register and be seen. Don't need ID nor address. Makes it ethically easy for us
 
vyv_cox said:
The two-month limit seems to have been a scare story. Just picked up three months worth at our pharmacy in Wales.
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That is OK then, because it was your comment that prompted me to raise it, when you posted #69 in the toolkit thread:nonchalance:
Had me worried!
Scaremonger :ambivalence::ambivalence::ambivalence::nonchalance::nonchalance:
OK, I saw #71:encouragement:
 
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Quantities issued on a prescription are still largely at the discretion of the prescribing doctor. The accepted norm for most repeat prescriptions is 2 months and has been for some years. Doctors can however, use their discretion to prescribe larger quantities depending on the patient, the medicines in question and the medical condition(s). 3 months will rarely be challenged by a pharmacist but quantities much larger than this might be. Oddly, the oral contraceptive pill is usually given in 6 month volumes. I don't know why.

There is no legislation or directive on this - it is just a guideline and an accepted norm. There may be sound reasons to limit the quantities. Some conditions require monitoring, some medications require monitoring and from time to time a medication has to be withdrawn. A recent example is ranitidine which has been withdrawn for safety reasons.

As for funding issues, the NHS serves those who are ordinarly resident. This is taken to mean here for a settled purpose. It will also serve visitors whose medical condtion is acute and cannot wait until return to their own country. Contrary to what you might read in the tabloids, health tourism is a very very minor issue. I rarely, if ever see people coming over here for the purpose of gaining healthcare, chielfy because the healthcare is actually better in their own country. A major drain on NHS resource is however, residents requiring travel advice and immunisations such as rabies, yellow fever, malaria and hepatitis for leisure travel. Voluntary exposure to the risks of serious communicable disease costs the country hundreds of millions of pounds a year.
 
Benny257 said:
A major drain on NHS resource is however, residents requiring travel advice and immunisations such as rabies, yellow fever, malaria and hepatitis for leisure travel. Voluntary exposure to the risks of serious communicable disease costs the country hundreds of millions of pounds a year.
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I think that the term "major drain" is unfair & a misuse of the term. Residents have a degree of entitlement to healthcare if they become ill. Less so if they do not.However, the NHS does budget for preventative treatment, ie flue jab.
I do believe that residents are entitled to travel & if they regularly returned with a dose of rabies, then the NHS might go into serious meltdown. On that basis one might argue that it is an entitlement & should be budgeted for. As such should not be described as a "drain".
In the same way I do not feel that it would be unreasonable for me to be able to ask for an extended supply of prescription drugs ( medical limits accepted , of course) when going on holiday. I stress "holiday" as opposed to "residency elsewhere" which could be construed differently.
Of course I may be wrong & I am certain others may disagree.
 
Benny257 said:
Quantities issued on a prescription are still largely at the discretion of the prescribing doctor. The accepted norm for most repeat prescriptions is 2 months and has been for some years. Doctors can however, use their discretion to prescribe larger quantities depending on the patient, the medicines in question and the medical condition(s). 3 months will rarely be challenged by a pharmacist but quantities much larger than this might be. Oddly, the oral contraceptive pill is usually given in 6 month volumes. I don't know why.

There is no legislation or directive on this - it is just a guideline and an accepted norm. There may be sound reasons to limit the quantities. Some conditions require monitoring, some medications require monitoring and from time to time a medication has to be withdrawn. A recent example is ranitidine which has been withdrawn for safety reasons.

As for funding issues, the NHS serves those who are ordinarly resident. This is taken to mean here for a settled purpose. It will also serve visitors whose medical condtion is acute and cannot wait until return to their own country. Contrary to what you might read in the tabloids, health tourism is a very very minor issue. I rarely, if ever see people coming over here for the purpose of gaining healthcare, chielfy because the healthcare is actually better in their own country. A major drain on NHS resource is however, residents requiring travel advice and immunisations such as rabies, yellow fever, malaria and hepatitis for leisure travel. Voluntary exposure to the risks of serious communicable disease costs the country hundreds of millions of pounds a year.
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Two months for me.

On a different note, I'm outraged that some local doctors and nurses do not seem to want to clear out excess ear wax in the UK . There now appears to be a booming market in sucking and hoovering out wax in our high streets. If only we had known this was going to happen before the Brexit vote. Anyone know if it's free in Holland or Belguim ?

Boots I think will do it for £35 . Could an oil extractor be modified for DIY ?
 
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Daydream believer said:
I think that the term "major drain" is unfair & a misuse of the term. Residents have a degree of entitlement to healthcare if they become ill. Less so if they do not.However, the NHS does budget for preventative treatment, ie flue jab.
I do believe that residents are entitled to travel & if they regularly returned with a dose of rabies, then the NHS might go into serious meltdown. On that basis one might argue that it is an entitlement & should be budgeted for. As such should not be described as a "drain".
In the same way I do not feel that it would be unreasonable for me to be able to ask for an extended supply of prescription drugs ( medical limits accepted , of course) when going on holiday. I stress "holiday" as opposed to "residency elsewhere" which could be construed differently.
Of course I may be wrong & I am certain others may disagree.
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Well, I think that's the first time I have agreed with every word Daydream Believer says :) :)

Can you imagine the cost if travellers just went and came back with Cholera, yellow fever and all sorts? Much cheaper to vaccinate!
 
john_morris_uk said:
We went sailing to France this year in the knowledge that I was running low on a particular analgesic that I was taking at the time and that's only available on prescription here in the UK. Our Dr said, "Don't worry, you can buy it over the counter in France."

No you can't. They changed the law several years ago... We sailed to Guernsey where the hospital relieved my of £138 to give me some more of the same drug...
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My experience is more recent, 8 weeks ago, though only for hypertension meds which, nevertheless, are prescription only in the UK.
 
Daydream believer said:
That is Ok then.
I will tell the 85 year old lady in our street, that if she can afford to walk to the village shop twice a week to get a pint of milk & a loaf of bread & risk catching flue, she can afford to pay for her own flue jab:encouragement:
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Come on, ever since I started travelling to places, sometime in the 70s, where vaccinations for unusual diseases were recommended I've expected to pay - where does this free idea come from ? I'm choosing to go to the place, surely I should take responsibility for the consequences ? A flu jab is more of a country wide cost saving measure so makes economic sense as the NHS is on the hook for the consequences anyway
 
RobbieW said:
Come on, ever since I started travelling to places, sometime in the 70s, where vaccinations for unusual diseases were recommended I've expected to pay - where does this free idea come from ? I'm choosing to go to the place, surely I should take responsibility for the consequences ? A flu jab is more of a country wide cost saving measure so makes economic sense as the NHS is on the hook for the consequences anyway
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So you have the hump because years ago you had to pay. Is that it?
It makes economic sense to vaccinate travelers.

What are the results of someone coming back with a disease that is contagious? What if the old lady decides that death is not far off, so decides not to bother with the expense of a jab & goes off abroad to use up the last of her savings & comes back with a plague of some sort?
What do you say then?
Because some will not bother, if it costs, & will take the risk. Then where will the NHS be? They cannot stop people traveling & they do not know where they are going, if not told.
Look what it costs when people go off on charity trips, helping others & come back with serious illnesses. It costs a fortune to isolate & treat them.
It could be argued that they should not have been allowed to go to places with diseases in the first place. How do you counter that?
Like it or not, the NHS is there to protect the health of the nation. It actually does a fair job, within the constraints imposed upon it.
 
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