A health watchdog says some residents are being pushed into digital services despite not wanting to and called on the health board to monitor the situation. 

Rutland Healthwatch chairperson Janet Underwood made the claim at last week's Health and Wellbeing board – a committee at Rutland County Council that promotes integration between health and local authority services. 

In a discussion of the pharmaceutical needs assessment, a document that each Health and Wellbeing Board must publish every three years mapping out pharmacy services and any gaps, Dr Underwood expressed concerns and said this summer one GP practice had been making people wait longer for prescriptions if they ordered them in person rather than online. She did not name the GP practice. 

She said:  "There are people who over the summer have not been able to just easily reorder their prescriptions by handing over a leaflet and are having to stand and queue for lengthy periods in one of our practices in Rutland. We have spoken to the practice concerned and know they have taken these measures for a short period to try to encourage people to move to digital.  

"Digital is easier for everybody, but we must not overlook those people who can't. This needs to be monitored – that is my concern." 

The pharmaceutical needs assessment document was consulted on over summer and the board decided to approve it. It concluded people are generally happy with the pharmacy provision and there were no gaps in provision, but some people have to travel further than others for services. 

Deputy chief operating officer at the Leicestershire and Rutland integrated care board Debra Mitchell said she understood Dr Underwood's concerns but she would have to push back on certain points. 

She said: "We talk about digital consultation in Rutland being difficult, yet when we did our recent consultation on some day access, the vast majority of the responses were done digitally. So there is sometimes a difference between anecdotal individual difficulties and a generalisation about the population." 

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She said allowing face to face and telephone access would take away time from GP practices to book appointments and take medical queries. 

She said: "The national direction is around analogue to digital and trying to encourage people to access services that maximise the overall healthcare available to the population. 

"I think it's important. However, all of that said, the issue about availability and ability to pick up digital access and order repeat prescriptions, we do need to make sure we have a facility that doesn't put anyone at risk or to disadvantage if they can't access." 

She said the development of the new hub at the local link in Cold Overton Road which will be attached to the Oakham Memorial Hospital could be where people were taught to use the digital app. She said: 'one of the easiest things to do on the NHS app is to request an NHS prescription.' but we will need to 'pick up' with our practices if they are refusing to allow people to order repeat prescription completely.  

"It is about why. If someone does not have access at all to any digital means, which is a very small amount of the population, they need to be able to order their repeat prescriptions." 

Debra Mitchell and Dr Underwood decided to discuss the matter further outside the meeting.