Inspection outcome: Standards met
Last inspection: 12/04/2019
Pharmacy context
The pharmacy is family owned and part of a small chain of independent community pharmacies. It is located on a small parade of shops in a residential area near to a large town in Kent, with a health centre (with two practices) and a dental centre nearby. It provides multi-compartment compliance packs to a number of people who live at home. And it provides a range of services including health checks and substance misuse medications.
Inspection summary findings
Principle 1. Governance
The pharmacy generally identifies and manages the risks associated with its services. It keeps records required by law but they are not always complete. So, they may not be reliable in the event of a future query. It actively seeks feedback from the public. And team members understand their role in protecting vulnerable people.
Principle 2. Staff
The pharmacy has enough trained team members to provide its services safely. They are provided with ongoing and structured training to support their learning needs and maintain their knowledge and skills. They can raise any concerns or make suggestions and have regular meetings. This means that they can help improve the systems in the pharmacy. The team members can take professional decisions to ensure people taking medicines are safe.
Principle 3. Premises
The premises provide a safe, secure, and clean environment for the pharmacy's services. The pharmacy generally protects people’s personal information. But the open view into consultation room may mean that people’s dignity is not always protected.
Principle 4. Services, including medicines management
People with a range of needs can access the pharmacy’s services. The services are generally well managed. But the pharmacy does not always remove expired prescriptions promptly, or highlight prescriptions for schedule 3 and 4 controlled drugs. This could increase the chance of medicines being handed out when the prescriptions have expired. The pharmacy gets its medicines from reputable suppliers. It responds appropriately to drug alerts and product recalls and makes sure that its medicines and devices are safe to use.
Principle 5. Equipment and facilities
The pharmacy generally has the equipment it needs to provide its services safely.
What do the inspection outcomes mean?
After an inspection each pharmacy receives one overall outcome. This will be either Standards met or Standards not all met
| The pharmacy has met all the standards for registered pharmacies | |
| The pharmacy has not met one or more of the standards for registered pharmacies |
What do the summary findings for each principle mean?
The standards for registered pharmacies are made up of five principles. The pharmacy will also receive one of four possible findings for each of these principles. These are:
| The pharmacy delivers an innovative service and benefits the whole community and performs well against the standards | |
| The pharmacy delivers positive outcomes for patients and performs well against most of the standards | |
| The pharmacy meets all the standards | |
| The pharmacy has not met one or more standards |