If a person is self-administering controlled drugs, they can keep them in their possession provided the controlled drugs are kept safely. A risk assessment should consider where the controlled drugs will be stored.

People’s own individually labelled controlled drugs (Schedules 2, 3 and 4 (Part I)) must be denatured before handing to the waste disposal company. The Environment Agency classes this as processing waste. Care homes with nursing will need to apply for a T28 waste exemption. This is free of charge. whether proof of identity was requested of animal owner or animal owner’s representative (yes or no) You must carefully select the injection equipment and use good technique to reduce wastage due to dead space in syringes. You must record the volume (dose) withdrawn on each occasion and write off the vial as unusable (destroyed) in the register once there is no useable volume remaining. You must have a policy or standard operating procedure that details how you manage controlled drugs in your service. This should cover:The Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 places controls on certain medicines. We call these 'controlled drugs'. List of currently authorised veterinary medicines containing controlled drugs updated 14 October 2019 You should consider recording the total use of the product, even if the reconciliation of the quantity used exceeds the nominal volume on the product stated on the label. This will help to ensure accurate record keeping of the use of the CD. Recording use and wastage of multi-dose preparations Prescriptions for controlled drugs are valid for 28 days after the date on the prescription. The Department of Health and Social Care strongly recommends that the maximum quantity of controlled drugs prescribed should not exceed a period of 30 days. You must use the register to record the receipt, administration, disposal and transfer of controlled drugs held by the care home. The following are important points:

A vet who works for a practice operating under the same franchising or branding (corporate group) as the practice requiring witnessed CD destruction, but the two practices do not belong to the same owner and are separate legal entities Some services may choose to store other schedule controlled drugs in the controlled drugs cupboard and record them in the controlled drugs register. You should always follow your service’s medicines policy. Schedule 3 NB: This book replaces the old CDBKN and CDBKB models – It is identical to the CDBKB however the difference between this and the CDBKN is that the ‘Proof of signature column’ is now a time column therefore making this column more applicable to the majority of our customers.There will be some wastage within the needle and hub of the syringe each time the product is withdrawn. If numerous doses are withdrawn, there will be considerably more product lost to this ‘dead space’ than if fewer doses are given. It is not possible to quantify exactly how much product might be wasted in the syringe hub and needle. There are international manufacturing standards which specify the maximum amount of ‘dead space’ that is permitted in needles and syringes of different sizes and gauges. You can obtain this information from manufacturers or wholesalers. In general, the smaller the gauge of needle or size of syringe, the less wastage occurs. Once the register has been completed the drugs that have been rendered irretrievable should be disposed of appropriately and in accordance with the Summary of Product Characteristics (SPC) and any local requirements.

The witness shall sign and date the entry; including a statement to confirm their independence and RCVS number: for example “I am an independent vet RCVS No: XXXXX There are no rules about which members of staff can hold controlled drugs keys in a care home. Providers should carry out a risk assessment to decide this. This should also be included in your controlled drugs policy. You do not need to record schedule 3 drugs in the controlled drugs register. However, you must store certain Schedule 3 drugs in the controlled drugs cupboard. This includes, for example, buprenorphine and temazepam. A vet who works in a practice that shares a premises with the practice requiring witnessed CD destruction, for example providing out-of-hours services from the same premises, but the two practices do not belong to the same owner and are separate legal entities ml single use vial – 0.6 ml drawn up and used leaving 0.4 ml remaining – this is considered waste and does not require formal witnessing of disposal.

You must avoid having discrepancies between the amounts recorded as used, the volume of product left in the vial and the total stated volume. Some vets use insulin syringes to minimise wastage. This is acceptable although it is important to ensure that the syringe allows accurate measurement of the dose in millilitres. In the presence of the witness, the vet of the practice where CDs are being disposed of should render the CDs irretrievable by one of the suggested means above. There are general requirements for working with CDs in addition to those in the Veterinary Medicines Regulations (VMR), these requirements are different in Northern Ireland.