Special Preparations and imported Unlicensed medicines
When a community pharmacy receives a prescription for a ‘special’ or unlicensed medicine, refer to the local Forth Valley process on managing specials. This process should be followed in full in order to establish if health board authorisation is required.
If health board authorisation is required, then an authorisation request form should be submitted to fv.fvspecials@nhs.scot. Similarly, if you are unsure whether authorisation is required or need advice on the authorisation process, please email fv.fvspecials@nhs.scot.
We no longer accept telephone calls about authorisation requests and the associated telephone contact number is no longer operational. All enquiries should be sent by email as above.
Key Points to consider
- Specials and Unlicensed products are not required to meet the same standards as licensed preparations.
- Before considering supply of an unlicensed medicine, every step should be taken to ensure that all licensed preparations and formulations have been ruled out, as well as ‘off-label’ use of a licensed product (e.g. opening capsules, dispersing tablets in water), before use of a Special/Unlicensed product is considered.
- Pharmacists should always contact the prescriber to advise when they have prescribed an unlicensed medicine to discuss alternatives.
- Patients need to be made aware when they have been prescribed unlicensed medicines.
- Both prescribers and pharmacists assume a greater responsibility and potential liability where unlicensed medicines are used.
- Only typed authorisation request forms will be accepted, please do not submit handwritten forms.
- Only forms sent from NHS email accounts will be accepted. Under no circumstances should authorisation forms be sent from personal email accounts.
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