The debate continues…

February 14, 2010 by admin 

A GP blogger on the Financial Times website argues that nurses wishing to learn diagnosis and prescription should do so at medical school on a reduced length course, rather than the “few weeks training” she believes they receive at present. Interestingly, the examples she quotes to back her argument were of inappropriate prescription requests from - yes - nurses who were not prescribers. Avoiding these sorts of scenarios was one of the reasons for introducing nurse prescribing in the first place.

Filed under: Latest News for Nurse Prescribers
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Nurse prescribing increased again in 2008

May 1, 2009 by admin 

Nurses prescribed 11.3 million items in 2008, a 20.2% increase on the previous year, according to figures from the NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA).  Penicillins (7.8%) and emollients (4.2%) are two of the items most commonly prescribed by nurses.

By 8 December 2008, there were 10 617 nurse independent prescribers and 21 792 community practitioners on the NHSBSA prescribers’ database. There are also 557 pharmacist prescribers and the volume of their prescribing increased by 86.6% in the year to December, with the NHSBSA receiving 121 093 prescriptions for processing, although prescribing by pharmacists in just three PCTs accounts for over 38% of total pharmacist prescribing.

Filed under: Latest News for Nurse Prescribers
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