Useful documentation for GP obligations to patients in Residential and Nursing Homes and Hospitals

GPC Guidance on providing care to NHS hospital and Private Hospital Patients, Residential and Nursing Homes

Link to our page on Nursing and Residential homes

Prescriptions for Care home - (Residential Homes and Nursing Homes)

Q -A local residential unit for young people is insisting that we fill out and sign the unit's own prescription forms to allow them to administer the medication to patients aged 10 -15yrs. Our practice has provided FP10s. Do we have to fill out and sign these forms?

New 17/05

Answer - There is no GMS obligation to fill in the unit's individual prescription sheets. If you are retained by the unit to provide a private service then they may of course insist that you do so if this is explicit or implicit in your contract.

The problem is that the The Care Homes Regulations 2001* specify that residential homes must have a written service user's plan and strict written protocols on the use of medications. In addition the UKCC insists that nurses must have clear written instructions if they are to administer a patient's medication. This puts the unit into something of a cleft stick.

It is probably in the patient's best interests to have a clear written instruction on the unit's standard care or prescribing sheets to ensure full compliance with your prescribing instructions, but this is a personal professional decision.

Perhaps a compromise could be agreed whereby the home would complete the prescribing sheet in compliance with your FP10 prescriptions and could bring the sheet to your surgery for you to countersign this as accurate?