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NHS England (NHSE) has said millions of patients in England can now receive an alert on their mobile phone or smartwatch telling them their prescription is ready. 

The new prescription notification system tells patients their prescription is ready to be collected at nearly 2,500 pharmacies, including every ASDA and Boots store.

Patients will receive alerts once they enable push alerts in the NHS app and can read more details about the status of their prescriptions on the app.

Independent Community Pharmacist has asked NHSE how many independent pharmacies the prescription notification system is linked to.

“The new alerts are being introduced following the success of the ‘Amazon-style’ prescription tracking feature in the NHS App, which has been used by nearly 2.9 million people since its launch last year,” NHSE said.

It said about one in three pharmacies in England, equating to over 3,200 stores, offer the prescription tracking feature in the app which has been used over nine million times since it went live last year. NHSE also said the app now has over 39 million registered users.

National Pharmacy Association chief executive Henry Gregg said the new prescription alert system was “an important step forward in making pharmacy services more accessible, making it easier for patients to access the medicines they need”.

“It also frees up staff time from answering phone calls so they can focus on delivering first class care,” he said. “This will also encourage more patients to download and make use of the NHS app.

"Pharmacies want to do all they can to embrace new technology and make the vital services they offer as easy and convenient as possible for patients to access.

"Many pharmacies already use tracking style technology and a number have invested in their own apps to allow this to happen."