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OpenPrescribing Newsletter: Winter 2024

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This post is part of a series: OpenPrescribing Newsletters

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Spot the difference blog series

One of the most common questions we are asked at OpenPrescribing is, Why does my OpenPrescribing output not match what I have found on another data analysis platform?

We have written two blogs about the two main reasons our results will not always be exactly the same as those displayed on alternative data analysis platforms:

  1. The other platform is using a different source dataset (Part 1)
  2. Analysts have made different analytic choices in the alternative data analysis platform to what we have made on OpenPrescribing. (Part 2)

New OpenPrescribing Blog Series

Here at OpenPrescribing we spend time making sure that our measures remain up-to-date, accurate, and relevant. Recently, we have been making some updates to our OpenPrescribing measures and have written a short blog series on the changes we have made, what we did and why. It includes a blog on our latest measures, how we write measures to avoid manual curation, and finally in our opinion, what makes a good measure!

BNF to dictionary of medicines and devices (dm+d) map

We are often asked if we have a way of converting BNF codes (which are used in the NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) data that we use to power OpenPrescribing.net) to dm+d codes.

We have created a map in the form of a CSV file, which is available to freely download here (which includes VTM mapping). We have written a blog on how the map was developed, and caveats in its use.

OpenPrescribing Updates

View analyse data for all PCNs within a sub-ICB locations.

New, updated and retired measures

⭐ Courses for amoxicillin 500mg greater than 15 capsules

⭐ Courses for doxycycline 100mg greater than 6 capsules/dispersible tablets.

⭐ Blood glucose testing strips not included in NHS England commissioning recommendations

⭐Prescribing of pregabalin (total mg) by all Sub-ICB Locations

♻️ NHS England - Items which should not routinely be prescribed in Primary Care

👋You can see a list of our retired measures here.

OpenSAFELY News

We are very happy to share an important announcement about the future of OpenSAFELY. Read this blog to find out more!

Since the start of the pandemic, much of the OpenPrescribing team have been building and researching in our powerful new OpenSAFELY platform for COVID-19 related research and service monitoring. You can read all our outputs on the website and our new OpenSAFELY reports website but we think the following blogs will be of interest: