Website of the Department of Health

Patient group directions (PGDs)

Patient Group Directions (PGDs) are documents which make it legal for medicines to be given to groups of patients - for example in a mass casualty situation - without individual prescriptions having to be written for each patient. They can also be used to empower staff other than doctors (for example paramedics and nurses) to legally give the medicine in question.

We have developed PGDs for the chemical and biological countermeasures and these are available below. Other PGDs will be published on this page as they are developed.

We are in the process of developing a training strategy but in the meantime you may find the PGDs useful in your emergency planning.

We have also produced a patient information leaflet on potassium iodate which provides advice to both health care professionals and members of the public.

The exemptions provided by Article 7 of the Prescription Only Medicines (Human Use) Order 1997 (the POM Order) mean that patient group directions are not needed for the following countermeasures, when given by anyone in an emergency to save life:

• Atropine sulphate injection
• Dicobalt edetate injection
• Glucose injection
• Pralidoxime chloride injection