Like many of us of a certain age, we like to escape the winter by taking the caravan to Spain from Christmas to Easter. Due to cost of ferries etc. we usually try to stay as long as we can thus reducing the effictive cost per day. This has worked well, reducing UK fuel bills during the most demanding time and keeping us healthy.
Also like many others we need to take prescribed medicines to stabilise common conditions which we obtain from our GP in the usual way.
This year, however, we are told that the maximum prescription can be for 2 months (in practice less as the tablets are in units of 28) and that if we are out of the country for more than 90 days we shall be de-registered by our GP practice and have to re-register on return.
The reasons given are that GPs are paid a fee per patient but only for an absence of the patient for up to 3 months, and that if they failed to de-register us they could be accused of fraud by taking money for 'non-existant' patients. This is clearly a nonsense in most cases but presumably there have been instances of GP's taking money for 'ghost' patients.
I believe I saw somewhere that the 90 day rule does not apply to those of us over 65 but can find no reference to this.
I would much appreciate any feedback or leads to other information sources (I have trawled the official NHS pages without result) and also any recent experiences on obtaining prescription medicines in Spain e.g. whether the patient copy of the NHS repeat prescription form is accepted without having to see a Spanish doctor, how easy it is to reclaim money from NHS when back in UK and any other useful tips.
Also like many others we need to take prescribed medicines to stabilise common conditions which we obtain from our GP in the usual way.
This year, however, we are told that the maximum prescription can be for 2 months (in practice less as the tablets are in units of 28) and that if we are out of the country for more than 90 days we shall be de-registered by our GP practice and have to re-register on return.
The reasons given are that GPs are paid a fee per patient but only for an absence of the patient for up to 3 months, and that if they failed to de-register us they could be accused of fraud by taking money for 'non-existant' patients. This is clearly a nonsense in most cases but presumably there have been instances of GP's taking money for 'ghost' patients.
I believe I saw somewhere that the 90 day rule does not apply to those of us over 65 but can find no reference to this.
I would much appreciate any feedback or leads to other information sources (I have trawled the official NHS pages without result) and also any recent experiences on obtaining prescription medicines in Spain e.g. whether the patient copy of the NHS repeat prescription form is accepted without having to see a Spanish doctor, how easy it is to reclaim money from NHS when back in UK and any other useful tips.