Need prescription repeats but Surgery insist we attend before issuing. What would you do?

Yes we always have to attend to get a new lot of prescriptions.These are usually for up to 6 months of repeats but the appointments are very brief.

Daughter has a spare bottle of hand sanitiser she will leave for us so we will have to hope for the best.

This seems to go against all the current advice about social distancing and very odd for a GP surgery where vulnerable patients may need urgent appointments! We use two methods of repeat prescriptions. My husband uses the Pharmacy2U where he orders his repeats online - it was a bit hit and miss to start with but seems to be ok now - he gets a reminder when his items are due for renewal and they come through the post within a couple of days. My own pharmacy has an app - I just order the repeat and it's ready for collection a day or so later - sometimes it's even ready the same day.

It seems on this occasion you will probably need to attend the surgery but I would definitely look into alternate methods of ordering. As this crisis deepens your GP's may well advise a different approach too.

TBH it doesn’t sound as though you have a choice, you will have to go. Take hand sanitizer with you or wear gloves and try to sit on your own.

But maybe your GPs want to alter your prescriptions?

Our surgery, after we have sent them an email, send our repeat prescriptions direct to our local chemist, who will deliver if necessary.

I’m surprised by this. Our dr sent an email saying they were closed, if we needed a repeat prescription or were ill we have to phone and speak with the receptionist for prescriptions or they we make an appointment for the dr to call back. Do you normally have to see the dr for prescriptions or is it a yearly review?