I assume the reason for authorised repeat prescription policy is so that patients see their GP occasionally for a review of their condition and medication, but could this policy be harming patients on long term medication?
My wife suffers from anxiety, panic attacks and agoraphobia and has been on the same medication for 10+ years.
Her agoraphobia has been bad for the past 2 or 3 years and she finds it impossible to visit the medical centre or her GP.
Can you imagine the distress it causes to a person like this who receives a letter out of the blue saying her medication will be stopped until she attends a review with her GP.
OK, a rational person would phone the medical centre and explain the circumstances, did the person who sent the letter out realise that people with mental health problems don’t always act rationally?
What my wife did was panic, hid the letter and buried her head in the sand.
She has now worked herself up in to a state, fearing her medication will be stopped and I am now trying to sort it for her.
Big question is what happens to the people with mental health issues who receive a letter like this who don’t have others to help them?
Ironically, I am on long term (be it seasonal) medication too for Asthma that I get in the hay fever season.
I’ve always just gone in and got my inhalers within 48 hours of needing them, I tried to get one the other day to find I have none on repeat prescription and now have to waste a GP or Asthma Nurses time just to get my inhaler prescription renewed.
Meanwhile I had my worst night of Asthma last night because I havn’t got my inhaler yet, and as any asthma sufferer will tell you just the fact you don’t have your inhaler makes you panic and the asthma gets worse.
It will probably be Wednesday at the earliest before I get my inhaler now, I am allready dreading tonight 