Scotland has issued a revised timetable for the rollout of its electronic transmission of prescriptions (ETP) project which it now aims to complete by the end of September next year, six months later than planned.
The latest estimates for the rollout of the Scottish ePharmacy Programme predict that all GPs should have access to ETP via the eAcute Medication Service (eAMS) by the end of February next year and that rollout to community pharmacists will be complete by September 2008.
Scotland had also hoped to begin to begin implementation of its eChronic Medication Service (eCMS) which will deliver repeat dispensing in 2007-8 but it is now due to be complete by the end of February 2009.
In a letter to chief executives of NHS Boards the Primary and Community Care Directorate said the new timelines “take into account the practicalities, including hardware and server upgrades and training requirements which are associated with IT programmes of this nature.”
The ePharmacy Programme says that all the GP system suppliers have completed Scottish Enhanced Functionality two testing as part of the national accreditation programme for GP IT systems and some have begun to rollout the functionality to practices.
On the pharmacy side two system suppliers are currently beta testing eAMS functionality and the others are about to enter fitness for purpose testing or are still at the software development stage.
The Primary and Community Care Directorate says it has set latest dates for the completion of the rollout of the eAMS and eCMS parts of the ePharmacy Programme.
They are 31 May 2008 for eAMS by GP system suppliers, 30 September 2008 for eAMS by community pharmacy suppliers, 31 August 2008 for eCMS by GP system suppliers and February 28 2009 for eCMS by pharmacy system suppliers.
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