The NHS DMS is an essential service for community pharmacy contractors. As an essential service, it must be provided by all community pharmacy contractors.
The service has been established to:
- make sure there's better communication of changes to a patient’s medication when they leave hospital
- reduce incidences of avoidable harm caused by medicines
By referring patients to community pharmacy on discharge with information about medication changes made in hospital, community pharmacy can support patients to:
- improve outcomes
- prevent harm
- reduce readmissions
Claiming for NHS DMS
Pharmacy contractors will receive a fee of £35 for each completed NHS DMS. The payment must be claimed on the Manage your service (MYS) portal no later than the fifth day of the month following that in which the NHS DMS was completed.
From 1 July 2024, if a contractor fails to submit by the deadline, later submissions will be accepted. This is only if made within 3 months of the date by which the claim should have been submitted. Later claims will not be paid.
If a pharmacy contractor is unable to complete the NHS DMS in full, they're able to claim the following fees for the stages of the NHS DMS that have been completed:
- Stage 1 - £12
- Stage 2 - £11
- Stage 3 - £12
If a contractor has not completed all stages of the NHS DMS they intend to complete, they should not yet make a claim.
If a contractor claims for all stages they provided but not a completed DMS referral, they must provide a reason to confirm why the NHS DMS service was not provided in full to the patient.
Information on part-completion claims can be found in Part VIA of the Drug Tariff.