Free prescription or not?

They are pacifiers because our pensions are not as good as some in the rest of Europe - or, in fact, in much of the developed world.

Yes I know that Jalima - I was trying to get grannypiper to address the illogicality of her post.

Coolgran65 it is a case of who pays for the drugs; in some cases the hospitals fund them, in others it is the GP surgery and others are funded by NICE or the CDF etc.
If it is not a drug which is specific to the ailment for which you see the Consultant they will usually ask you to go to your GP for a prescription, if it is something the hospital consultant is treating you for they will provide the prescription.
That is how my consultant explained it.

It is all funded by the NHS in the end, but they all have their own budgets which they have to adhere to.

If you're an inpatient the hospital will give you enough medication for a week or so on your discharge.

Aneey and others were talking about prescriptions given at A&E or outpatient appointments when you can't always get it filled by the hospital pharmacy at the time.

DH's chemotherapy drugs cost literally thousands of pounds a month, should he be paying for them too? Plus there are the dozen assorted drugs on his prescription from the GP.

Have you read the OP Deedaa? Nothing to do with GP prescriptions or drugs given to patients in hospital (and to take home).

But Ana grannypiper widened the discussion to free prescriptions in general and so the thread moved on - as often happens

Oh I see - yes, sorry!

But I still think that chemo drugs etc. are free for everyone and that wouldn't change if the policy on 'free prescriptions' was changed in Scotland, Wales and NI.

Yes I agree Ana - I just think there's a real illogicality in arguments about whether prescriptions should be free or not outside of hospital if the discussion doesn't consider whether health care in general shouldn't be means tested. I've got a very simple ( some might say simplistic) view on this. I can't see why we charge for prescriptions at all - the exemptions for specific conditions have not been reviewed for I don't know how long and are wildly out of date as are the exemptions for specific categories such as age, pregnancy etc. What is the logic in saying as grannypiper did that prescriptions should be paid for when we don't pay for other medical care - and before the pedants swoop, I mean of course don't pay at the point of use and I'm not including dental and optical although there is a whole debate to be had there as well

Oh I misunderstood grannypiper. I didn't realise they were free accross the board in Scotland, sorry

Rigby, no i don't think pensioners should pay regardless of income/savings, they have spent years paying NI contributions. The only way to have a "free at point of contact" prescription service is to increase the NI contibutions.It makes no sense that i who can afford 20p to buy paracetamol should be given a prescription for them, maybe you are right and we should review the drugs available on prescription and get rid of paracetamol, asprin and any other inexpensive over the counter medicines.

I admit to never having heard of this either, having to pay to have a prescription filled from a hospital. Normally the hospital will give you a day's supply of medication to give the patient time to take the medicine request sheet to their GP who then issues a normal script. I agree though, you would be happy to pay whatever it takes if it helps the pain !!

clementine, the hospital will give you a supply of medication to take home with you if you've been an in-patient.

The OP was talking about being issued a prescription after visiting A&E and it also applies to out-patients who are given prescriptions.