Nottingham and Nottinghamshire ICB
Around 90,000 patients received NHS treatment from community pharmacies for minor illnesses, urgent medicines supply and minor illness referrals in Nottingham and Nottinghamshire during the first full year of the new Pharmacy First service.
Pharmacy First includes NHS treatments for seven common conditions – sore throats, urinary tract Infections, earache, impetigo, sinusitis, shingles and infected insect bites for people in specific age groups (see full details below).
Almost all – more than 200 – pharmacies in Nottingham and Nottinghamshire are providing the Pharmacy First service. This is helping to free up GP appointments for people with more serious illnesses. Pharmacy First is usually available without an appointment and with trained pharmacists often available at weekends.
Between April 2024 and March 2025, it’s estimated that more than 13,000 hours of local GP and other healthcare professional time was saved by patients using the Pharmacy First service.
Treatments for sore throats and urinary tract infections were most frequently accessed of the seven conditions. As would be expected, there was a large increase in requests for infected insect bite treatments from May to September.
The busiest month overall for Pharmacy First consultations was December 2024, followed by March 2025.
Dr Dave Briggs, Medical Director at NHS Nottingham and Nottinghamshire, said: “Pharmacy First taps into the huge amount of clinical knowledge and expertise in pharmacy teams and provides our patients with access to high quality NHS care quicker at a convenient time and location.
“As public awareness and confidence has grown, it’s been really encouraging to see the number of Pharmacy First consultations increase through the year and the impact this has had in freeing up GP appointments and increasing access at weekends and bank holidays.”
Rob Severn, a pharmacist at Rowlands Pharmacy in Warsop and Chair of Community Pharmacy Nottinghamshire, added: “I am pleased to see the recently released data that shows how patients in Nottinghamshire have accessed the new pharmacy first service.
“I am also proud of how my fellow pharmacy professionals have risen to the call and provided high quality care for patients locally.”
See the Pharmacy First Nottinghamshire website for more information about the services available through Pharmacy First.
For more information about the full range of NHS services available at your local pharmacy, including blood pressure checks, vaccinations and oral contraception, see our Community Pharmacy section.
Pharmacy First consultations are free of charge. Appointments are usually available by just walking into a participating pharmacy, although an appointment may be required at busy times. Patients may also be referred to the service by the GP or other NHS service.
Pharmacy First is available for the following conditions (age restrictions apply):
Patients are seen by a trained Pharmacist in a private consultation room at the pharmacy.
Pharmacists can provide advice and, if clinically necessary, will offer an NHS medicine to treat the condition (NHS prescription charges will apply where patients normally pay for medicines supplied on prescription).
If the pharmacy team is unable to help, patients may be directed to a GP surgery or another NHS urgent care provider, as appropriate.
