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Richard Jefferson, head of programme commissioning at NHS England responsible for EPS and SCR, told Royal Pharmaceutical Society conference delegates about NHSE's work on technology that related to pharmacy.

The NHS.UK website now received more than 40m visits a month and NHSE was considering how to link services such as this with services such as NHS111. In relation to EPS, the spine had been made more robust so that it had not gone down once since last year. And the critical mass of users is growing, with 60 per cent of GPs now using it and 35 per cent of all prescriptions now going through EPS.

Last year's pilot study of pharmacy access to the summary care record showed strong benefits for patients. In 90 per cent of cases of SCR access, there had been no need for onward referral.

Code4Health is an NHSE initiative that has created an open for all collaborative workspace for all to find digital solutions for the NHS. NHSE now wants to set up an arm of this project built around community pharmacy.

Mr Jefferson was clear about why some technologies are more readily adopted than others. "New technology must be useful, useable and desirable and then it will get used. My key message is embrace technology"