Three community pharmacy pilot services could save the NHS £470 million a year if they were rolled out across England, according to the Community Pharmacy Future project.

Boots, Lloydspharmacy, the Co-operative Pharmacy and Rowlands Pharmacy collected two and half years’ worth of data on the services, which include a COPD case finder service, a COPD support service and a fouror- more medicines support service. The data was analysed at the University of East Anglia. The COPD case finder service, which piloted in 21 pharmacies, identified 135 people at risk of COPD and referred 54 to stop smoking services.

The COPD support service, which involved 306 patients in 34 pharmacies, resulted in 136 patients improving their inhaler technique and 72 per cent accessing smoking cessation advice. The third service supported 620 patients over 65 years taking multiple medicines, leading to a reduction in falls and an improvement in medicines adherence.

If scaled up to all pharmacies in England, the researchers calculated that the COPD case finder service could save £264 million a year, while the COPD support service could save £139 million, and the multiple medicines service could save £36 million in reducing hospital admissions and prescribing and another £34 million through preventing falls.