Darlington, Co Durham and Tees Area Team (AT) has confirmed that a community pharmacy influenza vaccination service will be commissioned again for the 2014/15 and 2015/16 flu seasons. The AT has informed the LPC that the scheme for 2014/15 will be broadly along the same lines as the 2013/14 scheme with some refinements based on learning from the season just gone.

There is a meeting of the AT’s flu steering group on 30 June after which further details (e.g. training requirements) will be available. The LPC will contact you again with more information as soon as possible, in the meantime we thought that you would appreciate as much notice as possible that the service will be recommissioned this year so you can begin to give consideration to making the necessary arrangements.

The LPC is delighted to announce  that  the CNTW (Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne & Wear) directorate of commissioning plan to commission pharmacists in the region to deliver the adult seasonal flu programme again in 2014/15.  

This will build on the excellent work last year when 49% of the pharmacies in CNTW delivered 15,603 seasonal flu immunisations – a 95% increase on performance in 2012/13.  
Overall the a total of 400,000 flu immunisations were delivered in CNTW in 13/14.

Claire Bradford, Head of Public Health, CNTW Area Team said "We hope that we can build on the excellent work from last year.  We want to focus on increasing the uptake in the under 65 at risk groups and pregnant women.  Last year across CNTW the overall uptake in under 65s at risk was 56.4% and pregnant women 42.2%.  Whilst we have good uptake in the over 65 year age group (75.7%) we need to reach many more of the under 65s at risk and pregnant women.  We think that pharmacies are well placed to increase uptake in these groups. Flu immunisation of pregnant women : reduces rates of influenza among pregnant women; may reduce the likelihood of prematurity and smaller infant weight at birth; provides passive immunity against flu to infants in the first few months of life."

The LPC are working with the area team on the detail of the service  and will make this available as soon as we can in the meantime we would like to take this opportunity to encourage ALL pharmacies to consider offering the service this year and start their preparations from now.

This is a fantastic opportunity for Community Pharmacy and  we would like to see all pharmacies in the area signed up to the service and help to make an impact on the uptake to immunisations.

Below is some information for you start preparing for this years service.  Should you have any queries please contact us.

As detail released we will update this site.

Training
If you have access to flu training (In house or via a training organisation) please make sure you get yourself trained or registered for training as soon as you can.  The LPC will be working with Novartis again this year to offer training.  Details for this will follow shortly.

Stock
We would also encourage you make arrangements from now to ensure you have adequate stocks of Vaccine.  

PharmOutcomes
Make sure you have got access to PharmOutcomes. 

Current Flu Information
Below are some flu related links for your information.
The national DH flu guidance/letter is now available online at  https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/316007/FluImmunisationLetter2014_accessible.pdf
The at risk groups this year include people with learning disabilities. This week’s vaccine update includes link to posters which can be used 
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/320026/8905_PHE_VU_216_June2014_07.pdf