Adastra offers e-prescribing to N Ireland customers

Clinicians in Northern Ireland using Adastra’s v3 case management system can now print a 2D barcode on their prescriptions – a requirement of the Northern Ireland Executive’s electronic prescribing system specification.

Users of the system can print prescriptions with a 2D barcode at the top, containing structured details about the patient and the drugs prescribed – similar to those now used in England.

Patients can then take the prescription to their chosen pharmacist where the barcode is scanned and the details retrieved off the barcode, helping both to cut transcription errors and to prevent fraudulent claims.

Prescribing related fraud in Northern Ireland is currently estimated to cost the tax payer £7-8m each year. The Health Executive has mandated that all electronic prescribing models in the country should include a way of checking the patient’s identity when dispensing medicines.

Using Adastra’s v3 On-line Clinician module, clinicians can use its existing prescribing module to print legitimate prescriptions, allocated with a unique barcode for verification.

Once the pharmacist has scanned the barcode the details are sent to Northern Ireland’s Electronic Prescribing and Eligibility System database for analysis and reporting, and the paper prescription is sent to the NHS Business Service Agency’s Prescription Pricing Division, which attaches a scanned copy to the electronic record.

The electronic system will enable future investigations to be undertaken electronically without the need to retrieve paper prescriptions from storage.

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