Cost of living: GPs warning over rise in prescription requests

The cost of living crisis is adding to pressures on GPs, the British Medical Association (BMA) in Northern Ireland has warned.

The BMA said that is because the number of people asking for prescriptions for medicines that can be bought over the counter is increasing.

That includes medicines like painkillers and allergy medication, Dr Alan Stout of the BMA said.

Prescriptions are free for everyone in Northern Ireland.

The rise in prescription request increases "the cost to the health service as a whole and the pressure on GPs", Dr Stout told BBC Radio Ulster's Good Morning Ulster programme.

"We have talked before about the difficulties people have accessing GPs and this is just more demand and difficulties," he said.

Dr Stout added: "I absolutely don't hold that against anyone, it is not our position as GPs to deny people medication or deny people prescriptions if they need this medication."

Over-the-counter medicines should be free, he added, and said there should be some sort of "easy and accessible way" for people to get the medicines they need.

But "they shouldn't really be coming through their GPs for prescriptions" as it adds to demand and cost, he added.

"It is a massively accentuated cost to the health service because it is far more expensive when we do it on prescription, in terms of the cost of time, administration, dispensing fees and everything else," Dr Stout said.

Terry Maguire, of the Ulster Chemists' Association, said he did not doubt the cost of living crisis was having an effect in relation to over the counter medication.

But he said there had been an issue for some time.

"There has always been a huge attempt to get medicines from general practice because there is a perception that is getting the medicines free of charge," he said.

"It seems unreasonable that paracetamol, that you can buy for £1.50, costs £12 when someone accesses it through a GP simply because of the mechanism involved in delivering that paracetamol."

Mr Maguire said anyone with a common condition should seek help at a local pharmacy first.

"Ask to speak to the pharmacist - they will advise you very quickly what you need.

"If that medicine is available on the Pharmacy First minor ailment scheme, you will get it free of charge."

Mr Maguire said expanding the number of conditions and medicines covered by the Pharmacy First scheme would further cut the numbers of people requesting prescriptions for over-the-counter medicines.