Happy Birthday, NHS! (But you’re still younger than us)

July 5th, 2013

When the NHS came into being on 5th July 1948, Bert and Vi Reed had already been operating this pharmacy for nearly 2 years. When we came here we inherited Bert’s prescription books, which make fascinating reading. For a start, every prescription was private, so each one had to be copied by hand into the prescription book. I can’t imagine trying to do that now. Quite apart from the writer’s cramp due to lack of practice, the number of prescriptions has increased substantially. We dispense around six times as many as Bert was doing then each day.

To what extent the NHS has increased that is hard to judge. I’m sure that in the days when you paid the full price of medicines there must have been a real disincentive to seek treatment. I can’t imagine what it would have been like trying to find the money to pay for your children’s treatment, for example, during hard times.

We have worked for the NHS since 1978, and in my eyes it remains one of the civilising glories of our country. That’s not to say I’m blind to its faults, but it has done a lot to make healthcare available to all, and nowhere is that better exemplified than in community pharmacies. You can just walk in off the street and get the help and advice you need.

Long may it remain so.

Our first Christmas

December 22nd, 2011

A Merry Christmas and our best wishes for the New Year to those who read these pages.

We’re coming to the end of our fifth month in the new pharmacy and the public response has been overwhelmingly positive. We set out to  revitalise an old building, provide ourselves with better working space and include some facilities people would like, and we seem to have done all those things satisfactorily.

A large number of people have come in with cards and gifts, for which we offer our thanks. It’s always good to know that your work is appreciated. Being human, we don’t always get things right, but I can promise that we try, and we learn from our mistakes.

We’re here for an hour on Christmas Day to dispense urgent prescriptions, so we hope you’ll understand what we mean when we say we hope we don’t see you then!

Welcome

September 13th, 2011

Welcome to the new Reeds Pharmacy website and blog.