§ Mr. BurstowTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what steps he is taking to ensure that general practitioner prescribing computer systems do not prevent pharmacists dispensing generic brands of the same drug with a different formulation; and if he will make a statement. [142062]
§ Ms Rosie WintertonThere are a number of commercially available computer systems that general practitioners may decide on their own initiative to use in assisting their choice of what medicine to prescribe for a patient. Any system used by a GP must meet a core set of Requirements for Accreditation (RFA). RFA was994W introduced in April 1993 to ensure general medical practice computer systems provided an agreed level of core functionality and conformed to national standards.
All generic medicines licensed for national health service use must meet the strict requirements of the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) and must be equivalent to, and have the same therapeutic effect as, the branded formulation. Some manufacturers of generic medicines may choose to market their product by using a brand name. In other instances, for example in the case of modified release generic medicines, the MHRA may require that these medicines are prescribed by a brand name so as to avoid any problems concerning bio-availability. However these products must also be licensed by the MHRA.
On receiving a script from a patient, a pharmacist is obliged to dispense the branded product if one has been specified by a GP. If, however, a GP has prescribed a generic medicine then a pharmacist is free to chose from amongst a range of licensed generic medicines.
When officials recently became aware that a major pharmaceutical company ad sought to change GP databases to default to their formulation of a medicine, action was taken to ensure that GPs were aware and prepared to over-ride their systems to select their preferred medicine.
These arrangements should be sufficient to prevent a pharmacist from dispensing any NHS generic medicine that has a different formulation from that prescribed by a GP—whether or not a GP used a computer system in making that decision. The forthcoming renegotiations of the 1999 Pharmaceutical Price Regulation Scheme will be used to consider the need for even stronger controls in this area.