Request

Under the Freedom of Information Act, I would like to request a subset of the Medicines dispensed in Primary Care data filtered by CHILDREN AGED 17 YEARS AND UNDER, FROM JANUARY 2019 TO JANUARY 2025.

I am interested specifically in the following variables and would like you to provide the information in Excel format:

Age of the patient,

Date of Prescription,

Type of prescription: in-patient (hospital admission) or outpatient,

Region,

Local Authority,

Practice Postcode,

Dispenser Postcode,

Name of the Drug,

Prescription dosage,

Route of administration,

Name of the Condition being treated (if available),

BNF Chemical Name,

BNF Presentation Code.

Date range: 1/1/2019 – 21/1/2025

On 6 February 2025, you clarified the time period as follows:

Thank you for highlighting this. Please could we have Nov 23 - Oct 24.

On the 5 March 2025 you clarified the following:

Would it be possible if we reduce our request to the following fields:

Age of the patient,

Date of Prescription,

Local Authority,

Name of the Drug,

Prescription dosage,

Route of administration,

Name of the Condition being treated (if available),

Sub-ICB location

Response

Some Information Not Held

Please note that we do not hold the following information relating to prescriptions:

Local authority, dosage, and condition being treated. In the case of local authority and condition, this information is not recorded on a prescription. Dosage is sometimes included by the prescriber, but this is not captured on our systems as this is not necessary for any purpose. Similarly, no data is captured relating to the clinical indication a prescription is intended for. We hold data on which drugs have been prescribed, but not the condition it was prescribed to treat.

Remaining Information

A copy of the information is attached.

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

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.

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.

• Items dispensed as part of a Pharmacy First service.

Data Source

The data source was the NHSBSA Information Services Data Warehouse.

Time Period

Data limited to November 2023 - November 2024 processing months.

Prescribed date

The prescribed date is only applicable to electronic (EPS) prescribing. The prescribed date for paper prescriptions has been set to the first day of the processing month. The SUBMISSION_TYPE field allows users to distinguish between EPS "real" dates and paper "artificial" ones. Note that for repeat dispensing, the date shown will be the prescription date for the first issue, and may appear out of range.

Organisation Data

The data provided is for prescriptions prescribed within a Sub-ICB Location (SICBL) within England.

The request includes multiple output .csv files, these are;

FOI02532_202311001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202311002.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202311003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202311004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202311005.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202311006.csv - 398,990 rows of data

FOI02532_202312001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202312002.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202312003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202312004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202312005.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202312006.csv - 282,050 rows of data

FOI02532_202401001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202401002.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202401003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202401004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202401005.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202401006.csv - 486,254 rows of data

FOI02532_202402001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202402003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202402004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202402005.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202402006.csv - 329,339 rows of data

FOI02532_202403001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202403002.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202403003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202403004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202403005.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202403006.csv - 464,950 rows of data

FOI02532_202404001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202404002.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202404003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202404004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202404005.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202404006.csv - 373,994 rows of data

FOI02532_202405001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202405002.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202405003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202405004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202405005.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202405006.csv - 439,781 rows of data

FOI02532_202406001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202406002.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202406003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202406004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202406005.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202406006.csv - 292,666 rows of data

FOI02532_202407001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202407002.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202407003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202407004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202407005.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202407006.csv - 295,355 rows of data

FOI02532_202408001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202408002.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202408003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202408004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202408005.csv - 325,712 rows of data

FOI02532_202409001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202409002.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202409003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202409004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202409005.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202409006.csv - 64,317 rows of data

FOI02532_202410001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202410002.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202410003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202410004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202410005.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202410006.csv - 254,466 rows of data

FOI02532_202411001.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202411002.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202411003.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202411004.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202411005.csv - 500,000 rows of data

FOI02532_202411006.csv - 301,788 rows of data

Data Queries

Please contact foirequests@nhsbsa.nhs.uk ensuring you quote the above reference if you have any specific questions regarding this response; or, if you feel you may be misunderstanding or misinterpreting the information; or, if you plan on publishing the data. 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 Information Services Data Warehouse, NHSBSA Copyright 2025” 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.