Archived: Oxford Online Pharmacy

Updated 28 July 2017

Oxford Online Pharmacy is based in Banbury in Oxfordshire. The provider, Frosts Pharmacy Ltd, set up this online service in October 2012 which includes consultation with a GP. The provider moved the online part of the service to an industrial unit in October 2016. We did not inspect the provider’s affiliated pharmacy. We inspected the online service which is known as Oxford Online Pharmacy at the following address:

Unit 7, Apollo Office Park, Ironstone lane, Wroxton, Banbury, OX15 6AY.

Oxford Online Pharmacy provides an online primary care consultation service and medicines ordering service. Patients register for the service on the provider’s website, select the medicines they want, complete an online consultation form which is reviewed by a clinician, and if approved, the affiliated pharmacy (which we do not regulate) sends the medicines to the patient by secure post.

Clinicians working for the provider are contracted through an external organisation. Those clinicians who have been deemed suitable to work for the service are given a personal identification number to log on to the provider operating system to review, request additional information approve or reject patients’ request for medicines.

The service can be accessed through their website, www.oxfordonlinepharmacy.co.uk where patients can place orders for medicines seven days a week. The service is available for patients in the UK and in the EU. Patients can access the service by phone or e-mail from 9am to 5.30pm, Monday to Friday and 9am to 1pm on Saturdays. This is not an emergency service. Subscribers to the service pay for their medicines when making their on-line application. Once approved by the prescriber, medicines are dispensed, packed and posted; they are delivered by Royal Mail tracked parcel delivery service.

Frosts Pharmacy Ltd was registered with Care Quality Commission (CQC) on 23 January 2015 and has a registered manager in place. A registered manager is a person who is registered with the CQC to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run. At the time of our inspection, the provider was in the process of updating their registration to reflect their new address.

Our inspection team was led by a CQC Lead Inspector accompanied by a GP Specialist Advisor and two members of the medicines team.

During our visit we:

• Spoke with a range of staff including the Managing Director, the Superintendent Pharmacist, a GP, a doctor and non-clinical staff.

• Reviewed organisational documents.

• Reviewed a sample of patient records.

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the service was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008.

Updated 28 July 2017

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Oxford Online Pharmacy on 24 January 2017. We found the service was not providing Safe, Effective and Well-led services in accordance with the relevant regulations. However, we found they were providing Caring and Responsive services in accordance with the relevant regulations.

Following the 24 January 2017 inspection, we served two warning notices to the provider on the 20 February 2017 under Section 29 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 which required the provider to become compliant by 3 April 2017.The full comprehensive report on the 24 January 2017 inspection can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Frosts Pharmacy Ltd on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

When we inspected the service in January 2017, we found that the provider had not updated their registration with regards to the address of the location where they were providing the regulated activities. The provider has since taken action to update the details of their registration and this has now been completed.

This inspection was an announced focused inspection carried out on 12 June 2017 to confirm that the provider had carried out their plan to meet the legal requirements in relation to the breaches in regulations that we identified in our previous inspection in January 2017. This report covers our findings in relation to those requirements and also additional improvements made since our last inspection.

Our key findings were:

• The provider had introduced a system to record, assess and manage significant events and incidents.
• Prescribing decisions were documented and made appropriately, based on medical history and made in line with risk assessed national guidance and best practice.
• The provider had introduced a new system to check patients’ identity and ensured that the system was consistently applied.
• Systems to manage and treat medical conditions had been reviewed and improved.
• Systems had been introduced to assist patients in the event of a medical emergency during consultation.
• Consent to care and treatment was sought in line with legislation and guidance and recorded.
• All staff had received training relating to the Mental Capacity Act 2005, health and safety and fire training.
• The provider had reviewed its systems and processes in relation to recruitment checks to ensure this was in line with legislation.
• Systems and processes had been introduced to ensure the effective governance of the service.

• The provider had ensured regular team meetings and clinical meetings were held and minutes from those meetings were documented and made available to all staff.
• Learning from complaints and feedback were shared with all staff.

We found the provider had taken actions to make improvements and were now providing safe, effective and well-led services in accordance with the relevant regulations.

Professor Steve Field CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP

Chief Inspector of General Practice