As a crucial part of Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin, the Prescription Ordering Direct (POD) team processes medication requests for a number of GP practices throughout the county.

The POD team consists of 50 dedicated individuals operating a small call center from Ptarmigan House, in Shrewsbury. Their call volumes are far from small – on an average, the team answers up to (a heroic) 45,000 phone calls each month. That’s approximately 2,250 calls each day!

They also receive 30,000 email requests for prescriptions each month, and in total, they process between 60,000 and 70,000 prescription requests every month.

POD Service Manager, Stephanie Munro, said: “I’m so proud of my team. They work extremely hard every day to ensure patients can order the prescriptions they need quickly and easily. The team is always helpful and go the extra mile whenever they can to make patients’ lives easier.

“Positive feedback from our patients boosts the whole team, during what has been an exceptionally busy time.”

Here are just a couple of examples of what our patients say about the POD team:

“This service is really helpful. I was number 50 in the call queue, but you answered really quickly and you’re always friendly. It’s a thumbs up from me.”

“No doubt, this Christmas will be another very busy time for the team, but I would like to… thank everyone within POD for their efforts and to say you really are a bunch of unsung heroes.