Empowering you to meet regulatory and best practice requirements

Since the launch of the Pharmacy Incident & Event Reporting System (PIERS) eight years ago, the pharmacy business has continued to evolve and grow. To ensure that PIERS can continue to fulfil both NHS and Company requirements, the system has been reviewed, and this has resulted in some streamlining and restructuring of some of the reporting forms.

From April 2023, the new Pharmacy Incident Report Form must be used to report ALL incidents involving the supply of a prescribed medicine such as prescribing; receipt of a prescription; dispensing, including accuracy checking; and handout or delivery. It must also be used to report any incidents involving the administration of a medicine via a pharmacy service. This new form replaces the Dispensing Incident Report Form and the Pharmacy Services & Pharmacy Study Incident Report Form.

Other events that have occurred in the pharmacy must continue to be reported using the Other Pharmacy Event Report Form, and unresolved Controlled Drug stock discrepancies must still be reported using the Controlled Drug Balance Discrepancy Report Form.

To support you with these changes, mandatory MyHub learning has been assigned to each pharmacy team member and store leader. This learning must be completed by 30 April 2023.

To listen to Claire Nevinson, Superintendent Pharmacist, discuss the recent changes to PIERS and the importance of robust incident reporting and investigation, click here.

This month, your Patient Safety Champion will be helping all pharmacy team members to understand the importance of incident reporting. This will be achieved by supporting each pharmacy team member and the store leader in completing the mandatory MyHub learning regarding the changes to PIERS. In addition, your Patient Safety Champion will ask you to consider your reflections on the benefits of incident reporting and investigation. As part of this, we encourage you to consider your answer to the question: why is incident reporting important to me?

Pharmacy team members are reminded of the need to be alert to the possibility of fraudulent prescriptions, as well as being aware of the different ways in which these may manifest and appropriate actions to take should you suspect prescription fraud.

There has been a recent increase in the number of fraudulent prescriptions presented to pharmacies in some areas of the country. Typically, these have appeared as private prescriptions for Schedule 4 and 5 Controlled Drug items such as codeine, zolpidem and zopiclone. However, a fraudulent prescription may be received for any drug with or without the potential for misuse.

Should you receive a prescription that you believe to be fraudulent, we encourage you to contact The Pharmacy Helpdesk for advice. In addition, guidance is available on BootsLive. Any incident involving a fraudulent prescription must be reported on PIERS using the Other Pharmacy Event Report Form, selecting the type of incident 'Security Incident,' within the required timeframe. 

Team members are reminded that all proposals for locally commissioned pharmacy services must be reviewed by the Boots Healthcare Partnership Manager (HPM) for your region or the country-specific equivalent (the Welsh Pharmacy Affairs Manager, the Scottish Relationship and Revenue Manager, or Northern Ireland's Country Pharmacy Manager). Following that team member's review and approval, an agreement for a locally commissioned service must be signed by a Boots UK Company Director or the Company Secretary and must not be signed at store/local level.

If your store receives an invitation to express an interest in delivering a new locally commissioned pharmacy service, or any other correspondence/contact relating to such a service, please notify the HPM or country­ specific equivalent, as applicable. Alternatively, please contact the Contracts Team via email to pharmacy.contracts@boots.co.uk for your query to be directed to the appropriate team member.