The Hidden Costs of Not Having Pharmacy Support in General Practice

General practice in England faces growing pressure. GP numbers have declined while patient lists continue to expand. This has created a workforce that is often overworked and under-resourced.

Beyond the visible strain on appointment capacity, there are hidden financial, clinical and workforce costs that many practices underestimate when they operate without pharmacy support. When practices lack clinical pharmacists or pharmacy technicians, GPs absorb work that could safely sit elsewhere. This leads to wasted clinical time, increased risk of medication errors and higher rates of staff burnout.

For practice managers, PCN leads and clinical directors making staffing decisions, understanding these hidden costs matters. Calculating the ROI of clinical pharmacy integration can help quantify what your practice stands to gain.

Key takeaways

• Medicines-related work consumes significant GP time when pharmacy support is absent.
• Lack of pharmacy oversight increases exposure to prescribing errors and avoidable harm.
• Practices without clinical pharmacy teams face higher burnout risk and missed opportunities for proactive care.

How Much GP Time is Taken Up by Medicines-related Work?

Prescribing, reviewing and managing medicines takes up a significant portion of GP time. Recent polling by the Royal College of General Practitioners found that half of GPs report over a quarter of their daily workload involves administrative tasks. Much of this relates to repeat prescriptions, medication queries and routine reviews.

Without dedicated clinical pharmacy support, these tasks fall to GPs by default. Every prescription query answered by a GP is time not spent with a patient who needs clinical assessment. Every routine medication review conducted by an already busy doctor is capacity lost from complex care.

Clinical pharmacists and pharmacy technicians are trained specifically to manage this work. They can handle repeat prescribing, conduct structured medication reviews, respond to medication queries and support patients with long-term conditions. When these roles are absent, GPs take on the additional workload. This often affects both their wellbeing and the practice’s overall efficiency.

What is the Cost of Medication Errors in Primary Care?

Medication errors carry a substantial financial burden across the NHS. Research published in BMJ Quality & Safety found that around 237 million medication errors occur in England each year. While most are minor, an estimated 66 million are potentially clinically significant. Primary care prescribing accounts for roughly 34% of these.

The same research calculated that avoidable adverse drug reactions cost the NHS at least £98.5 million annually. These consume over 181,000 hospital bed days. Errors are more likely to occur when clinicians are rushed, overworked or managing tasks outside their core expertise. Practices without pharmacy support face greater exposure to this risk.

Clinical pharmacists bring medicines expertise that reduces prescribing errors and improves safety. They identify drug interactions, ensure appropriate dosing and catch problems before they reach the patient. Without this layer of oversight, errors are more likely to go unnoticed.

How Workload Pressure Drives GP Burnout and Retention Issues

Workload pressure is a leading driver of GP burnout and early exit from the profession. The 2024 NHS Staff Survey found that 42% of staff reported feeling unwell due to work-related stress in the previous 12 months. Additionally, 30% said they often or always feel burnt out because of their work.

For GPs specifically, a survey by the RCGP found that 76% believe patient safety is being compromised by excessive workloads. Some 60% reported they do not have enough time to adequately assess and treat patients during appointments.

Practices without pharmacy support add to this problem. When GPs absorb medicines-related work on top of their clinical caseload, stress increases and job satisfaction falls. Over time, this contributes to early retirement, reduced hours and difficulty recruiting replacements.

Integrating clinical pharmacists and pharmacy technicians helps distribute the workload more sustainably. It allows GPs to focus on complex clinical cases while pharmacy professionals handle medicines optimisation. This creates a more balanced team and a more manageable working environment.

Missed Opportunities for Proactive Care

Structured medication reviews are a core element of the PCN DES. They are also an important tool for improving patient outcomes. These reviews identify patients at risk of harm from their medicines, reduce inappropriate polypharmacy and ensure treatments remain suitable over time.

Without pharmacy support, many practices struggle to deliver SMRs at scale. GPs often do not have the capacity to conduct detailed reviews alongside their existing appointment load. This means missed opportunities to intervene early, prevent hospital admissions and improve quality of life for patients with complex medication regimens.

Clinical pharmacists are well placed to lead this work. With protected time for medication reviews, they can work through priority patient cohorts systematically. They flag concerns and make evidence-based recommendations. Practices that invest in pharmacy support are better positioned to meet their contractual requirements and deliver proactive care.

Making the Case for Change

The hidden costs of operating without pharmacy support include GP time consumed by lower-complexity tasks, increased exposure to medication errors, heightened risk of burnout and missed opportunities for structured care. These costs accumulate over time and have a measurable impact on practice performance and patient safety.

For PCN managers and practice leaders considering workforce decisions, the evidence supporting pharmacy integration is clear. The question worth asking is whether your practice can afford to continue without it.