Order a Prescription
Repeat Prescriptions
Repeat prescriptions are for patients with long term medical conditions who receive regular treatment.
A medication review (usually with our practice pharmacist or a doctor) is carried out yearly.
Repeat medications are usually authorised for 6 months, which means that you should be able to order your medication on a regular basis (usually every 4 weeks) without any delay.
It is really helpful to us and quicker for you if you can order your medications giving 48 hours notice. Only order items that you need as this avoids over-ordering and wasted medications.
Online Repeat Prescription ordering
You can order a prescription online in any of the following ways
If you need help with any of these, please let our reception team know, who can organise online access for you.
Other methods of ordering
If you are unable to use online prescription ordering you can order in the following ways
- By hand – tick the items you need on the right-hand side of your previous prescription and post it in the box on the wall in the foyer
- By post – tick the items you need on the right-hand side of your previous prescription and send it to us.
What we expect from you
- Please give 48 hours notice of your request.
- It is your responsibility to check your stock of medication and ensure you do not run out and need to request a repeat prescription at the last minute.
- Do not stockpile drugs at home, please return them to your local pharmacy who can dispose of them
Annual Review
At least once a year, we need to review your medications and reauthorise them. This often involves having blood tests, blood pressure and weight checks, plus others depending on your health needs.
Remembering your tablets
If you are having problems remembering to take your regular medications, you can buy daily or weekly pill boxes which you or someone you trust can fill in advance.
If this is not possible, you can ask your chemist to do this for you, but this process is quite costly to the NHS so is reserved for those people who have no one else to help them with this.
Prescriptions at your chemist
We now send all prescriptions electronically to the chemist of your choice. If you do not have a chemist we will allocate one for you. You can ask your chemist to update your preference or ask the surgery staff to do this for you. You can change your chosen chemist at any time.
NHS prescription costs
Hospital requests for medication
Please note these are normally non-urgent and can take several working days to process, depending on when we receive the information.
If you have a hospital prescription you should exchange this at the hospital pharmacy, as they are not accepted in community pharmacies.
Medication we can't prescribe
Paracetamol and other over the counter medicines
The cost to the NHS of prescribing medications that can be purchased inexpensively over the counter is enormous. For that reason, we no longer prescribe paracetamol, cold remedies, muscle rubs, vitamin D, and hayfever medication. To learn more click on the link below:
https://www.sheffieldccg.nhs.uk/Your-Health/medicines-you-can-buy-over-the-counter.htm
Gluten-Free Products
We also no longer routinely prescribe Gluten-Free Foods for adults now that these are universally available in shops.
Blacklisted Products
Also, doctors are not allowed to prescribe blacklisted drugs to our patients on the NHS. This includes products such as shampoos, mouth wash, toothpaste, oral drops, eye drops, multivitamins, socks, certain creams for skin, and beauty lotion.
Many items are blacklisted and are not available on prescription in Sheffield. The majority of these items are available to buy over the counter
Non-repeat items (Acute Prescriptions):
Non-repeat prescriptions, known as ‘acute’ prescriptions are medicines that have been issued by the Doctor but not added to your repeat prescription records. This is normally a new medication issued for a trial period and may require a review with your Doctor prior to the medication being added onto your repeat prescription records. Some medications are recorded as acute as they require to be closely monitored by your Doctor. Examples include very strong pain medication, Anti-depressants and drugs of potential abuse.
Items no longer available on prescription:
NHS routinely monitors costs of medication and some may not continue to be available on prescription from your GP. NHS instructs all GP practices to consider costs when prescribing medications. So, you may notice substitutions: Examples include
- Multiple brands of Calcium and Vitamin D chewable tabs substituted to Calci-D tabs.
- Aveeno cream substituted with Zeroveen cream or Aproderm cream
- Using emollient creams to wash instead of Bath and shower emollients
- Branded medication substituted with generic equivalent medication
- Very high-value medication substituted with cheaper alternatives as they are available.
