Thank you for your request for information about the following:

Request

‘Please can you provide an excel datasheet showing total unique patient numbers for the below BNF codes.

0212000B0AAAAAA

0212000B0AAABAB

0212000B0AAACAC

0212000B0AAADAD

0212000B0AAAFAF

0212000B0AAAGAG

0212000B0AAAHAH

0212000B0AAAIAI

0212000B0AAALAL

0212000B0AAAMAM

0212000B0AAANAN

0212000B0AAAPAP

0212000B0AAAQAQ

0212000B0AAARAR

0212000B0AAASAS

0212000B0BBAAAA

0212000B0BBABAB

0212000B0BBACAC

0212000B0BBADAD

0212000B0BBAEAL

0212000B0BBAFAM

Please can the data be split by ICB location, Age, BNF code.

I would like each row of data to show the total patient number of each ICB & BNF & Age.

Date range: 01/09/2023 – 31/08/2024’

[On 25 November 2024 you clarified your request as follows]

‘Please could you provide for:

0-9

10-19

20-29

30-39

40-49

50-59

60-69

70-79

80-89

90+’

The NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) received your request on 15 November 2024, with clarification received on 25 November 2024.

We have handled your request under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) 2000.

Our response

I can confirm that the NHSBSA holds the information you have requested, and a copy of the information is attached.

Please read the below notes to ensure correct understanding of the data.

NHSBSA

NHS Prescription Services process prescriptions for Pharmacy Contractors, Appliance Contractors, Dispensing Doctors and Personal Administration with information then used to make payments to pharmacists and appliance contractors in England for prescriptions dispensed in primary care settings (other arrangements are in place for making payments to Dispensing Doctors and Personal Administration). This involves processing over 1 billion prescription items and payments totalling over £9 billion each year. The information gathered from this process is then used to provide information on costs and trends in prescribing in England and Wales to over 25,000 registered NHS and Department of Health and Social Care users.

Data Source

The data source was the NHSBSA Information Services Data Warehouse.

Exclusions

The Data excludes:

• Items not dispensed, disallowed and those returned to the contractor for further clarification.

• Prescriptions prescribed and dispensed in Prisons, Hospitals and Private prescriptions.

• Items prescribed but not presented for dispensing or not submitted to NHS Prescription Services by the dispenser.

Please note data for drugs flagged in our database as Schedule 2 and 3 controlled drugs have been excluded from this dataset for information security reasons to prevent the identification of organisations with high levels of controlled drug dispensing.

Time Period

September 2023 to August 2024 inclusive.

Organisation Data

The data provided is for prescriptions prescribed and dispensed in England.

BNF Code

The BNF Code is a 15 digit code in which the first seven digits are allocated according to the categories in the BNF and the last 8 digits represent the medicinal product, form, strength and the link to the generic equivalent product. NHS Prescription Services has created pseudo BNF chapters, which are not published, for items not included in BNF chapters 1 to 15. The majority of such items are dressings and appliances which NHS Prescription Services has classified into four pseudo BNF chapters (20 to 23).

Drugs and appliances

Limited to BNF Presentations:

0212000B0AAAAAA

0212000B0AAABAB

0212000B0AAACAC

0212000B0AAADAD

0212000B0AAAFAF

0212000B0AAAGAG

0212000B0AAAHAH

0212000B0AAAIAI

0212000B0AAALAL

0212000B0AAAMAM

0212000B0AAANAN

0212000B0AAAPAP

0212000B0AAAQAQ

0212000B0AAARAR

0212000B0AAASAS

0212000B0BBAAAA

0212000B0BBABAB

0212000B0BBACAC

0212000B0BBADAD

0212000B0BBAEAL

0212000B0BBAFAM

Identified Patient Count

The count of unique patients who have received one or more prescription items within the selected criteria. Patients who could not be identified by means of a valid NHS number on the prescription form are excluded. The figures for the number of identifiable patients should not be combined and reported at any other level than provided as this may result in the double-counting of patients.

Where patient identifiable figures have been reported they are based on the information captured during the prescription processing activities. Please note, patient details cannot be captured from every prescription form and based on the criteria used for this analysis, patient information (NHS number) was only available for 99.80% of prescription items, and 99.57% for age.

Age Band

As per the request, patients have been grouped into the following age bands: 0-9, 10-19, 20-29, 30-39, 40-49, 50-59, 60-69, 70-79, 80-89, 90+.

Data Queries

If you have any queries regarding the data provided, or if you plan on publishing, the data please contact foidata@nhsbsa.nhs.uk ensuring you quote the above reference. This is important to ensure that the figures are not misunderstood or misrepresented.

Reusing the data and copyright

If you plan on producing a press or broadcast story based upon the data please contact communicationsteam@nhsbsa.nhs.uk. This is important to ensure that the figures are not misunderstood or misrepresented.

The information supplied to you continues to be protected by the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 and is subject to NHSBSA copyright. This information is licenced under the terms of the Open Government Licence detailed at:

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/

Should you wish to re-use the information you must include the following statement: “NHSBSA Copyright 2024” Failure to do so is a breach of the terms of the licence.

Information you receive which is not subject to NHSBSA Copyright continues to be protected by the copyright of the person, or organisation, from which the information originated. Please obtain their permission before reproducing any third party (non NHSBSA Copyright) information.