The administration cost of setting up a pharmacy led supply scheme for gluten-free food on prescription should be minimal.

A PCT in Cumbria piloted the pharmacy-led supply scheme in 2009. Existing members of their staff took on the administration tasks required to implement the initiative. This took a part time employee approximately three months – but it should be noted that this was to organise the scheme from scratch. Once the programme was in place, administration requirements comprised of data collection for finance and required approximately one working day per month.

We have designed a toolkit so that there is a template approach which can be simply rolled out in any new area and Coeliac UK is happy to help with communication to promote a smooth implementation.

In Northamptonshire, administration related mainly to devising contracts and paper claims. Initially this took a 0.4FTE around two weeks each month to process the claims. Since 2009 Northamptonshire has processed claims using an online claim service. This has proved very efficient and reliable, heavily reducing workload. The cost of this service would depend on the number of pharmacies and number of services commissioned. Northamptonshire use the online service for six enhanced services.