Empowering you to meet regulatory and best practice requirements 

As a pharmacy provider, Boots UK is required to have internal and external reporting processes in place for any patient safety incident that has happened in one of our stores.

In line with NHS regulatory requirements, pharmacy incidents in stores in England will be reported using the new NHS Learn From Patient Safety Events (LFPSE) system. No additional action is required in store, as the information required will be extracted from the incident report on PIERS and sent automatically to the NHS system. Any contact from the NHS team requesting further information or details about the incident will be monitored for, and managed by, the central Superintendent Pharmacist’s Office team. Note: there are no changes to external reporting for stores in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales.

To help team members in England to learn more about the LFPSE system and external reporting of pharmacy incidents within Boots, mandatory MyHub learning has been assigned to each pharmacy team member and store leader. Look out for further information about the MyHub learning and the changes to PIERs which is coming soon.

Store leaders and pharmacy team members should be aware of the requirement to report any incident involving a CD or unresolved CD balance discrepancies; this includes all drugs listed in Schedules 2 to 5. Incident details should be sent to the appropriate Controlled Drugs Accountable Officer (CDAO) (or other specified roles) via the country-specific approved method: 

The report should be submitted once the investigation has been completed – this allows for all learnings and actions to be documented accurately. Prior to submission, the report should be reviewed by a Pharmacy Support Manager (PSM) or Professional Standards & Quality Manager (PSQM). PIERS has been updated to prompt the investigator to enter details of external reporting to the CDAO when entering the details of an investigation into an incident involving a CD item.

Please contact The Pharmacy Helpdesk for any queries regarding when, how or where to submit a report.

Healthcare professionals are personally responsible for keeping their knowledge and skills up to date and relevant to their roles and responsibilities. All healthcare professionals delivering NHS commissioned services must complete and be able to evidence any associated mandatory training for each service. All pharmacists delivering NHS vaccination services in England are also required to complete the CPPE DoC at least once every two years to maintain service readiness. After completion of training, a copy of the ‘Statement of Declaration’ must be printed, signed and stored in each pharmacy that the pharmacist provides a vaccination service(s). This evidence must be available to produce as and when requested.  

Following a review of the latest evidence, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) has advised a move from 2 doses to 1 dose for the UK HPV Vaccination Programme for immunocompetent individuals, including gay and bisexual men and other men who have sex with men (GBMSM), aged under 25 years. JCVI concluded that a single dose provides comparable efficacy to the 2- or 3-dose schedules in this age group. Any individuals aged 25 years or over will continue to be offered 2 doses. Individuals who are immunocompromised or HIV positive will be offered 3 doses, irrespective of their age. This change will be implemented in England, Wales and Northern Ireland from September 2023 (and was implemented in Scotland in January 2023). The PGD for our private HPV Vaccination Service will be updated to align with this new guidance and you will receive further communication about this in due course. Note: The PGD will include the option for customers to follow the 2-dose or 3-dose schedule if they express a preference for this.