Northern Ireland - Nurse and Independent/Supplementary Prescribing

Northern Ireland HPSS have now issued cut sheet prescriptions for Community Practitioner Nurse Prescribers and Independent/Supplementary Prescribers.

For paper prescriptions, doctors use form type HS21, nurses HS21N and Extended Nurses HS21X.

Community Practitioner Nurse Prescribers and Independent/Supplementary Prescribers (including Pharmacists) in GP practices who have access to the GP's computer will use the same blank prescription forms as GPs in order to avoid the need to switch paper in the printer. Community Practitioner Nurse Prescribers and Independent/Supplementary Prescribers employed by the LSC can print scripts, if they are working in the practice; excluded are those who are not working in practices who therefore have no access to a clinical system.

On nurse prescriber prescriptions:

• A banner at the top of the drug items section will be displayed as either Community Practitioner Nurse Prescriber, or Nurse Independent Supplementary Prescriber.
• The nurse's 4 digit cipher code will be printed on the right-hand side of the form.
• The nurse's name (title, initials and surname) will be printed under the stamp together with the practice address and postcode (if employed by the practice), or the Trust name, address and postcode (if employed by the Trust).
• The 2D barcode displays as it is for GP prescriptions.
• In Northern Ireland, Community Practitioner Nurse Prescribers and Independent/Supplementary Prescribers are permitted to print Batch Repeat Prescriptions.
• In Northern Ireland, Independent/Supplementary prescribers are able to issue private prescriptions in Vision.
• Independent/Supplementary prescribers in Northern Ireland are eligible to print private controlled drug prescriptions in Vision. This does not include Pharmacist Prescribers who are not permitted to prescribe any controlled drug.

http://www.dhsspsni.gov.uk/non-medical-prescribing

The PCD code should be entered in Control Panel - File Maintenance - Staff - [nurse] - Identifiers, selecting PCD code in Identifier Type. It has the format 6AAAAA (eg 6ABCDE).

Pharmacist Supplementary and Independent Prescribers are likely to come on line in the future.