Quality standard
This quality standard covers assessing if people need help with their medicines and deciding what medicines support is needed to enable people to manage their medicines. It also includes communication between health and social care staff, to ensure people have the medicines support they need. It describes high-quality care in priority areas for improvement.
The quality standard assumes that the responsibilities for providing medicines support have been agreed between the relevant NHS and local authority commissioners.
Before any medicines support is provided by a social care provider, commissioning and contractual arrangements need to be discussed, agreed and recorded as part of the local care planning process. This is to ensure that it is clear who is responsible and accountable for the decisions being made, and which providers will deliver each aspect of medicines support.
How to use NICE quality standards and how we develop them
Quality standards help you improve the quality of care you provide or commission. They apply in England and Wales (see the UK government website and Welsh government website). Decisions on how they apply in Scotland and Northern Ireland are made by ministers in the Scottish government and Northern Ireland Executive.
Find out how to use quality standards and how we develop them.