Request

You asked us:

Please provide assistance under the Freedom of Information Act to help me in obtaining the information I require.

Question 1: Please could you provide the same information as you did for me under FOI-01607 last year, but rather than the giving the information grouped by the SICBL_NAME and SICBL_CODE fields, grouping it the attached list of organisations instead (column A)? For clarity, I do not require the SICBL fields and only require the information for the attached organisations. I would like this information grouped by month for the calendar years 2024 and 2023.

Question 2: with the same fields as above but omitting BNFID, items, quantity and NIC fields, could you also provide monthly unique patient counts for these organisations for the 3 aggregated product groups, which are also outlined in the attached spreadsheet, for the same time period.

You clarified your request as follows:

Where the F Codes do not match NHSBSA’s data, they may be omitted.

The NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) received your clarified request on Monday 21 March 2025.

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

Our response

I can confirm that we hold the information you have requested and a copy of the information and notes explaining this is attached.

Please read the 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 one billion prescription items and payments totalling over £9 billion each year.

Exclusions

The data excludes:

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

• prescriptions prescribed and dispensed in prisons, hospitals and private prescriptions.

• prescription 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 is the NHSBSA Information Services Data Warehouse.

Time Period

The data is limited to and covers the period of January 2023 until December 2024 processing months.

Organisation Data

The data provided is limited to dispensing by the list of contractors provided. See Appendix 1 for the contractor list and groupings. Some provided contractors could not be found in the NHSBSA organisation database and have been excluded. There are no limits on the prescribing organisations

For Part_2, only patients with an identifiable NHS number have been included.

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

foi02655_part_1_202301.csv - 187,587 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202302.csv - 178,363 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202303.csv - 192,518 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202304.csv - 174,111 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202305.csv - 182,554 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202306.csv - 193,554 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202307.csv - 188,224 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202308.csv - 189,673 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202309.csv - 189,328 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202310.csv - 186,744 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202311.csv - 191,464 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202312.csv - 185,095 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202401.csv - 193,893 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202402.csv - 186,934 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202403.csv - 183,827 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202404.csv - 194,025 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202405.csv - 190,644 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202406.csv - 188,794 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202407.csv - 199,050 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202408.csv - 194,063 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202409.csv - 194,747 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202410.csv - 203,020 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202411.csv - 195,483 rows of data

foi02655_part_1_202412.csv - 193,869 rows of data

foi02655_part_2.csv - 48,967 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: “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.