Londonwide LMCs have received a number of enquiries from practices around the issue of private online providers offering weight loss medications to patients and the requests that these services generate.
Our Medical Directors have reviewed this issue and concluded a failure to respond could essentially be deemed as ‘tacit confirmation’ that the patient has no contraindications to the treatment. That said, if the patient came to any harm, the private provider would be expected to justify why they came to this conclusion, but equally questions could be asked of the practice as to why they did not respond, when they clearly knew medication was to be prescribed.
Whilst this falls outside of GMS/PMS essential services, noting the above predicament, we suggest a template response is used to send to the provider. Given the majority of patients have full online access to their health records, it is fair to state that the practice/GP is unable to confirm if the patient has any contraindications to the medication and suggest the private provider review the patient’s medical records with them (with the patient’s consent) to determine if the medication is appropriate for them to prescribe.
Practices could also contact the provider directly to politely explain the difficulties that such requests present and try to agree a shared understanding as to how the matter may be resolved. Although we appreciate this is an area where there are likely to be multiple providers and having such a discussion with each one who contacts the practice may not be a proportionate use of time.
Template wording:
“Dear xxx
Re (Name of patient to be inserted)
Thank you for your email/letter of (insert date) asking if the above patient suffers from any contraindication to the medication you propose to prescribe.
Unfortunately, the practice is under substantial pressure to provide NHS care and not resourced to respond to requests from private providers. Hence, I suggest that you review their medical records with the patient, which the patient should be able to access online, to enable you to determine if the medication is indeed appropriate for you to prescribe.
Yours etc”