L.I.F.T

Local Initiative Finance Trust (LIFT)

LIFT is a major Government initiative aimed at stimulating more investment in primary care and will result in an increase in purpose-built health centres as GP's and other related healthcare providers are brought together in 'One stop' centres.

Almost 50 schemes are planned across England involving 40% of PCT's and it is expected that as a result, 500 new one stop centres will be under way by the end of 2004 and that 750 will be operational by 2008.

More than 3,000 GP surgeries have been targeted for refurbishment or replacement and there will be renewed emphasis on a move towards group practices following the 'Shipman' report. The Scottish Executive is also looking at the plans with interest and therefore a substantial number of pharmacies are potentially affected by the resultant changes.

All pharmacy owners who may be affected will find themselves having to decide whether to join the "one-stop" centres, or to remain where they are and develop their existing business further, to counter the business which may be lost from the re-located GP's. This may involve further investment in modernisation and refurbishment together with the offer of a greater range of services in order to compete.

Either way you are going to need an increased level of financial investment and it is essential that you do their homework thoroughly and your sums accurately.

Statim can help you to focus on assessing all the factors that could prove to have a bearing on your business.

Those factors include:

• Assessing the impact of staying put whilst some doctors' surgeries move away to join the new health centre. What sales will be lost and how can they be replaced?
• Assessing the impact of moving, taking into account the likely premium which may be payable to the developer and the lost OTC sales which will probably arise as a result of the move.
• Considering whether the option of forming a consortium in conjunction with other local contractors, would be a viable alternative.

The location of the centres - not just within the local PCT area but also neighbouring ones, is key to this assessment.

The LIFT proposals will have an impact on each pharmacy, including goodwill value and plans should be formulated at the earliest opportunity. You should contact your PCTs as soon as possible to discover if any LIFT schemes that could affect you, are being planned and talk to the local surgeries to find out their intentions.

You should seek advice from your own professional advisers and Statim, on drawing up business plans, arranging finances, and preparing comparative profit and loss accounts for a health centre location as well as for the current location after the centre opens.

If local pharmacies make the right decisions and take the right measures to protect and develop their business, then health centre pharmacies may not end up getting the lion's share of the volume. With ETP, pharmacy prescribing and the new contract, pharmacists will have the opportunity to create their own centre of excellence in their own pharmacy. This may require additional financial investment but that is where Statim can help.

Community pharmacies should embrace change and see the proposals as a stimulus to providing a wider range of service, including health checks, minor ailment treatment and prescribing, and thus build upon their professional status. They must become a front-line ambassador for the NHS.

Some pharmacists will see that all the transformations that are going on are exciting, others as doom and gloom. It is those with the positive approach who will flourish.