With a drive from the recent Health White Paper to increase the organisational role of GPs, are the most clinical aspects of the doctor’s job being taken away? There has been a big push over the years to increase the role nurses play in the NHS, what was once a supporting role to doctors has now become an integral part of diagnosis and treatment. Now doctors have another competitor, the chemists.

The role of UK pharmacists is changing as they take on more of the tasks of GPs. Simon Cromptom wrote in The Times, “with a prod form governments keen to make health services available at more convenient times, and a push from pharmacists’ leaders who want the profession to move on, chemists’ shops are becoming the new health centres.” Future roles include vaccination, diabetes diagnosis and treatments for minor illnesses such as conjunctivitis and dermatitis.

Advantages of the diversification of the role of chemists are clear. A survey in June found that on average GPs see six patients an hour. However chemists can often provide advice, tests and treatments for at least 25 people in this time. Crompton spoke to Manji, a chemist located in Hackney. Manji argues the importance for the expansion of his role, “a doctor generally sees people when they’re ill, I see them when they’re well and can perhaps head off illnesses. I can address the issues that GPs can find annoying when they down have time don’t have time.”

An expansion of the role of chemists is not just in competition with doctors but also complimentary in nature. Manji says when talking about having to explain the results of a cholesterol test to a person as he did not understand his doctor, “some doctors will say this is treading on their toes, but most will say thank you for sorting this out. We work closely with doctors. If we take the time to explain medicines to people, how they work, they’re more likely to use them properly.”

Sue Sharp, chief executive of the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee supports this notion, “GPs don’t have the time to communicate and people often don’t hear what doctors say. Pharmacists have the time and the training.”

As with most problems in the NHS this issue inherits complexities when you consider the breakdown of communication within the system, which can have devastating results, for instance in 2009 a woman was given the anti-histamine Cetrezine instead of the anti-depressant prescribed, Citalapram. She noticed the difference in names, when she checked the box, to see “why I felt so low.” She went into the pharmacy and queried the different names but was told by a chemist that it was the same drug but a different brand. It was only after a visit to the GP a month later that this mistake was corrected. This raises an important issue of competence.

Clearly, some chemists lack the medical knowledge to take on a greater role in medicine. A more serious example of the effect of negligence is the case of Carmel Sheller. In 2007, Ms Lee a pharmacist dispensed proporanolol (anti-hypertensive) instead of prednisolone (anti-inflammatory) while working at a pharmacy in Tesco resulting in the death of this 72 year old woman.

I advocate the diversification of the role of chemists. I believe they are a great asset to the NHS and the humbled enthusiasm of Manji, gives me every reason to trust him. However I do suggest that such a move should not be taken lightly by the Government, whose plans will become clear when their proposals for primary care are set out this autumn.