The announcement of the new contract details on Monday has rightly been met with some consternation and concern.
Whilst a catchy headline figure, it just is not substantial enough to enable pharmacies to continue to operate as they have traditionally: chasing Rx item-volumes, plugging in more, increasingly expensive staff and tinkering with the efficiency of the dispensary workflow. More workload and even greater losses.
At the same time, a recent insight post by RWAPharmacy highlighted. that the latest data shows only 50% of available NMS interventions and payments were completed on average. Money left on the table. And whilst Pharmacy First utilisation suffers due to lack of GP referrals and public awareness, this low NMS number is indicative of constrained capacity at pharmacy branches. Increasingly busy pharmacists are doing more and more unprofitable dispensing, missing out on an opportunity to generate some profit. This situation will only be exacerbated with the new contract, which precludes the use of external NMS resources.
So how are your branch pharmacists going to increase their NMS completion rates and claim this funded revenue? How are they going to maximise the opportunity provided by other current and future NHS services? How can they have the headspace to train, launch and deliver private services at volume?
A transformational approach is required to create the significant capacity required, in order to deliver this service-led profitability.
Improved PMR workflows or local robotic shelving can sharpen up the operational efficiency of a dispensary to a degree, but if you are serious about this transformation at scale, then Hub & Spoke, assembling 50-70% of your items, is the only real option.
Live for over a year at our own group of branches, HubRx has released our staff to increase NHS service delivery by 400%, deliver a record seasonal vaccination campaign, roll out new NHS and private services and build appointment volumes month-on-month. All with fewer staff hours.
Our HubRx service will be live for customer pharmacies, including single-branch businesses, later this year and it can provide you with the ability to release on average 15 hours a day of capacity, to be used for service provision and cost control. All whilst benefiting from our unique at-cost scale purchasing, which offsets the HubRx fee.
Using HubRx to undepin your stressed pharmacy business requires no automation-provider decision, no installation project, no capital expenditure, no staffing, no ongoing commitment and no loss of potential services consulting space.
Book a call with us or run through our benefits calculator to see the extent to which HubRx can transform your pharmacy business in the face of a constrained 2025-26 contract.