An improved notification system will be in place this year, alerting practices to which patients have received the flu vaccination, it has been announced. The service, created by NHS Digital, sends the information electronically from pharmacies to GP practices. NHS Digital reported on Monday (30 December) that it has been expanded ahead of this winter,…

Practices in Northern Ireland have been told to cease giving flu vaccines to patients under 65s because of “phenomenal” demand. Practices have been running clinics in church halls, community centres and car parks to comply with the government plan to extend the vaccination campaign this year. In common with other parts of the UK, the…

It’s flu season, yay! Not yay really… As a PM, I used to loathe flu season with its enormous amount of work, including juggling staff, patients and of course vaccine deliveries, hoping your reception team wouldn’t forget to put the vaccines in the fridge, despite this being tattooed on their foreheads. Somehow, I still felt…

Sometimes I feel like I must be Bobby Ewing from the 80s’ American soap opera ‘Dallas’. If you’re too young to remember, after a particularly bad few months, when during the storyline he’d actually died, the viewer was taken back to a scene in the shower where, thankfully, the last few months had all been…

I was really excited when James from Practice Index approached me with the idea of a ‘practice manager panel’ where we could discuss topical issues on the podcast.  The practice manager voice hasn’t always been as strong as it could be on the General Practice podcast, and this was the perfect opportunity to put that…

Having scoured the gov.uk website, so far I can’t see anything about planned changes to the flu vaccination campaign this year. That said, I did find this document which provides some clues about the way things might develop. I’ve deliberated before over what the flu season might look like this year. Unsurprisingly, I didn’t manage to secure any…

This year’s flu vaccination season looks set to be the most important one in recent memory – and probably the most complex practice managers will have experienced. With the threat of a catastrophic second wave of Covid-19 infections hanging over the health service, ensuring as many people as possible receive the required vaccination is critical.…