Longer prescription lengths:

See the (Short) Practice Prescription Policy

It has been announced that early in 2026, some medicines may be available from one prescription for up to 12 months. Please do not expect this to be the norm or necessarily apply to you, as it is based on a political decision to change a legal requirement, when it should, and will remain a medical decision. Furthermore, it will NOT extend the dispensing amounts and dispensing timing at your pharmacy, so it is not reducing pharmacy supervision, just undervaluing the General Practitioner supervision, potentially producing a reduction in patient care.

My experience, shared by many other GPs, is that even if someone is on a single medication, patients will often have some health concern raised, either by the patient or myself during a face-to-face consultation and this increases to every consultation when there is polypharmacy. That unmet need when a repeat prescription is dispensed without a face-to-face consultation doesn't go away so the next face-to-face consultation often has two additional health issues but the same booked time, meaning either the problems are not adequately addressed or other patients are unfairly kept waiting. This concept is well described in the following poem, generated and recently shared by a Dr April Armstrong: Just a Script One morning brought a little boy, his puffer running low, "Just a script," his mother smiled, "then off again we'll go." But I heard a wheeze beneath his words and saw his tired eyes, So we searched beyond the obvious and found the hidden why. A woman came to start the pill, "A simple script today, Just contraception, nothing more, then I'll be on my way." But heavy bleeds and migraines hinted all was not as it seemed, So we found a safer path to take than the one she'd first conceived. Then came a weary mother with her baby on her chest, "Just help me get some sleep, doctor; I'll manage all the rest." But the light had left her smile and the colour left her face, So we named the dark that followed birth and helped her find her place. A tradie wanted stronger pills for headaches growing worse, "They wake me up most mornings now, and work just makes them curse." But coughing made them thunder and blurred the edge of sight, So we sent him for a scan that day and not another night. A teenager felt tired and flat. "It's iron, that's the bet. I'm busy, stressed and run-down, doc; there's nothing serious yet." But bruises, pallor, weight loss too, suggested more than chance, So we drew the bloods that afternoon and never missed a glance. For a script is just a doorway, never why a patient comes; The clues are often hidden in the pauses, fears and hums. What looks routine from far away can change with what we know The years, the trust, the history, the things no records show. A decade spent in learning, and often decades more in care, Teach us when a passing symptom needs a deeper question there. Not every illness shouts aloud; some whisper, faint and slight - And medicine is seeing what is there before it's plain in sight. The script was never really it; that's only where we start. The value lies in judgement formed by science, skill and heart. For general practice lives in trust, built quietly over years - And sometimes what saves a patient is what isn't written here.