FOI-02755

Thank you for your request for information about the following: 
 
Request 
 
I seek data held by NHS Business Services Authority relating to the national use of neuromuscular blocking agents (NMBAs) and sugammadex in NHS hospital settings across England from 1 January 2019 to present. Please provide the following: 
  
1. Annual usage data (by year) for the following neuromuscular blocking agents: - Rocuronium - Atracurium – Vecuronium 
 
2. Annual usage data (by year) for sugammadex across NHS hospitals in England. 
 
3. If available, the number of sugammadex administrations where it was coded or recorded in connection with suspected or confirmed NMBA-induced anaphylaxis. 
 
The NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) received your request on 14 April 2025.  
 
We have handled your request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA).   
 
##Our response 
 
NHS Prescription Services process prescriptions for pharmacy contractors, appliance contractors, dispensing doctors and personal administration with information then used to make payments to pharmacists and appliance contractors in England for prescriptions dispensed in primary care settings (other arrangements are in place for making payments to dispensing doctors and personal administration). This involves processing over one billion prescription items and payments totalling over £9 billion each year. The information gathered from this process is then used to provide information on costs and trends in prescribing in England and Wales to over 25,000 registered NHS and Department of Health and Social Care users. 
 
Questions 1 and 2 
 
Under Section 21 of the FOIA, we are not required to provide this information for questions 1 and 2 because it is already accessible to you. To view Section 21 in full:  
 
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2000/36/section/21  
 
You can also request a paper copy of Section 21 by contacting me. 
 
The information you have requested is available in our Secondary Care Medicines Data (SCMD) with Indicative Price dataset on our Open Data Portal: Finalised Secondary Care Medicines Data (SCMD) with indicative price - Datasets - Open Data Portal 
https://opendata.nhsbsa.net/dataset/finalised-secondary-care-medicines-data-scmd-with-indicative-price.  
 
We publish the SCMD on behalf of NHS England (NHSE). This dataset provides the total quantity of medicines issued in Dictionary of Medicines and Devices (dm+d) unit dose and the indicative cost for NHS trusts in England. 
  
You should note that whilst we publish this dataset on behalf of NHSE, we do not own the data. This means that we would recommend contacting NHSE for any further questions. 
  
The SCMD data that we can provide is limited to drugs that were prescribed in hospitals and then subsequently dispensed in the community. There is no data in ePACT2 from 2019 onwards for the following drugs: 

•	Rocuronium  

•	Atracurium 

•	Vecuronium 
 
Question 3 
 
We do not hold this information and cannot confirm if this data is available elsewhere. 
 
Publishing this response 
 
Please note that this information will be published on our Freedom of Information disclosure log at: 
 
https://opendata.nhsbsa.net/dataset/foi-02755  
 
Your personal details will be removed from the published response. 
 
Data Queries 
 
Please contact foirequests@nhsbsa.nhs.uk ensuring you quote the above reference if you have any specific questions regarding this response; or, if you feel you may be misunderstanding or misinterpreting the information; or, if you plan on publishing the data. 

Reusing the data and copyright 
 
If you plan on producing a press or broadcast story based upon the data, please contact communicationsteam@nhsbsa.nhs.uk. This is important to ensure that the figures are not misunderstood or misrepresented. 
 
The information supplied to you continues to be protected by the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 and is subject to NHSBSA copyright. This information is licenced under the terms of the Open Government Licence detailed at: 
 
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/  
 
Should you wish to re-use the information you must include the following statement: “NHSBSA Copyright 2025”. Failure to do so is a breach of the terms of the licence. 
 
Information you receive which is not subject to NHSBSA Copyright continues to be protected by the copyright of the person, or organisation, from which the information originated. Please obtain their permission before reproducing any third party (non NHSBSA Copyright) information. 

Tags: BNF, NHS Prescription Services
Organization: Freedom of Information Disclosure Log