PCN Senior Clinical Pharmacist
Job overview
We have an exciting opportunity for an enthusiastic, committed, and motivated senior pharmacist to join our established Primary Care Clinical Pharmacy Team (PCCPT) in Dudley Place.
As a team we are committed to the development of primary care pharmacy. We have been established for over 20 years developing primary care pharmacy services to meet the needs of our practices and patients in Dudley.
The post holder will work as part of a multi-disciplinary team to provide medicines optimisation and prescribing support activities within the PCCPT delivering on a comprehensive workplan which will include the PCN DES, Black Country ICB work streams and strategic PCN initiatives.The post holder will contribute to safer patient care through provision of clinical audits, regular review and monitoring of patients based on clinical need. The post holder will act as an advisory resource to practices in relation to medicines optimisation, medicines waste, medicines adherence, admissions avoidance and repeat prescribing.
Prior experience of working in General Practice or a similar clinical role would be ideal.
We have a strong emphasis on team working, supporting each other to professionally develop and meet our key objective of improving the health and wellbeing of our local population.
If you have a passion for providing patient centred healthcare and are committed to developing as a senior clinical pharmacist we would really like to hear from you!
Main duties of the job
The duties and responsibilities are intended to be indicative but not exhaustive of the responsibilities of the post holder. PCCPT will develop flexible work programmes to meet the needs of our practices and population, as such the requirements of the job may develop and change
The post offers candidates the opportunity to become involved in a wide range of patient facing activities such as chronic disease management, structured medication reviews, medicines reconciliation, safer prescribing initiatives as well as our work to support population health interventions to address health inequalities.
You will be required to Undertake clinical structured medication reviews with patients taking high risk drugs (within scope of professional practice) and review for ongoing need and appropriate monitoring, making recommendations to senior staff/GP as appropriate.Arrange suitable follow up appointment(s) to monitor the effect of any changes implemented.
Although we support flexible working opportunities our primary care clinical pharmacist roles are predominately practice based to ensure we are working closely with our multidisciplinary teams.
You should have excellent written and verbal communication skills as well as experience of influencing others and conducting clinical medication reviews.
Working for our organisation
At the Dudley Group our patients and staff are at the heart of all that we do and that is to provide a world class service that aligns with our vision of “excellent health care, improved health for all”. We are seeking to recruit staff who share our vision and values of making Dudley Group an incredible workplace.
As part of the NHS People Promise, your wellbeing is our priority, and we are committed to ensuring our employees achieve a healthy work-life balance supported by our flexible working options and by making reasonable adjustments where possible.We believe no-one should have to sacrifice family, friends, or their personal interests for work. We are a modern employer able to attract and retain high quality staff through our commitment to the NHS People Promise.
As an employer, we foster an inclusive environment where everyone feels valued, supported, and empowered to contribute their best. We want to ensure that our workforce is representative of the population we serve. More information - inclusive practice people promise.
Dudley Group offer many opportunities for our staff to develop and grow within their roles through our Learning & OD Team. These include topics such as communication, wellbeing, team development, cultural competency, and values.
Please click below to view our EDI page: Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion - The Dudley Group NHS Foundation Trust (dgft.nhs.uk)
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
The post holder is a pharmacist with an MPharm degree (or equivalent) plus 1 year pre-registration(foundation year) and 3 years’ experience of working as a registered pharmacist. Prior experience of working within a general practice environment would be ideal however we will consider candidates with significant clinical experience.
The post holder will work within their professional boundaries as part of a multi-disciplinary team in a patient-facing role.
The post holder will have completed (or be in the process of completing) the Primary Care Pharmacy Education Pathway and the IP qualification. Completion of further relevant post graduate education is desirable for example post graduate Clinical Pharmacy Diploma.
The post holder will provide support to general practice staff with respect to medicines optimisation and medication queries. They will help support a safer repeat prescription system, deal with acute prescription requests, medicines reconciliation and safer transfer of care between care settings.
They will contribute to audit and quality improvement including promoting and support of antimicrobial stewardship. They will reduce risk and improve medicines related care through provision of direct patient facing and remote medication review.
The following job description outline should be read alongside the Job Description:
Key priorities for this role are to:
- Provide support and guidance to pharmacy technicians, students and junior pharmacists working within the team.
- Plan own workload to ensure high priority patient specific and other activities are dealt with in a timely fashion.
- Work with colleagues in the PCCPT to carry out clinical audits and implement required changes to patient care in line with the PCN Direct Enhance Service, Investment and Impact Fund Indicators and medicines safety and quality workstreams.
- Optimise benefit of prescribed medication through high levels of compliance and concordance achieved by support for the patient and carers.
- Provide professional input to practice medicines related activities including review and support for repeat prescribing systems and medicines related policies and procedures.
- Liaise with local community pharmacy colleagues to ensure accurate and effective medication management and support collaborative working.
- Provide direct care to patients with long-term conditions and other clinical areas within scope of professional practice, communicating specialist advice in accordance with care plans which have been devised in accordance with local and national guidance on best practice.
- Support the care of complex patients in their own homes or in nursing or residential accommodation as part of a multidisciplinary team.
- Provide professional leadership on matters relating to medicines optimisation and quality improvement, including antimicrobial stewardship, opioid deprescribing and polypharmacy structured medication reviews.
- Support service development through proposing and implementing changes for your clinical area which may also impact on other disciplines.
- Produce monthly reports on work completed.
- Establish and promote safer prescribing practice
- Contribute to medicines safety work through the analysis and prioritisation of high risk drugs monitoring, medication safety indicators and other practice based clinical reviews to promote safe and effective prescribing. Support the process of implementing changes to prescribing and guidance for practitioners.
- Contribute to practice based / NHS Trust incident reporting systems with an emphasis on medicines safety and the dissemination of learning
- - Provide patient facing clinics for those with questions, queries and concerns about their medicines in the practice.
- Undertake clinical structured medication reviews with patients taking high risk drugs (within scope of professional practice) and review for ongoing need and appropriate monitoring, making recommendations to senior staff/GP as appropriate. Arrange suitable follow up appointment(s) to monitor the effect of any changes implemented.
- Undertake clinical structured medication reviews in vulnerable housebound patients at risk of hospital admission and harm from poor use of medicines, review for ongoing need and appropriate monitoring, prescribing within scope of professional practice or making recommendations to senior staff/GP as appropriate. Arrange suitable follow up appointment(s) to monitor the effect of any changes implemented.
- Provide a telephone help line for patients with questions, queries and concerns about their medicines.
- Answers medicine related enquiries from GPs, other practice staff, other healthcare teams (e.g. community pharmacy) and patients with queries about medicines, suggesting and recommending solutions within scope of practice, escalating to senior colleagues where necessary. Providing follow up for patients to monitor the effect of any changes.
- Support safe and timely medicines reconciliation
- Support Implementation of a practice repeat prescribing policy. Support the repeat prescribing reauthorisation process by reviewing patient requests for repeat prescriptions and reviewing medicines reaching review dates. Reduce medicines risk by utilising clinical system alerts and ensuring patients are booked in for necessary monitoring tests where required
- Contribute to clinical audits and improvement projects (prescribing incentive schemes) through collaboration colleagues such as GP registrars, practice managers, community services, public health etc.
- Utilise clinical system search results and prescribing data to contribute to identification of areas for intervention. Promote evidence-based practice and interventions to improve patient outcomes.
- Support antimicrobial stewardship initiatives and promote appropriate prescribing of antimicrobials.
- To reconcile medicines following discharge from hospitals, intermediate care, step down care from care homes, including identifying and following up unexplained changes preparing recommendations for management and rectification of anomalous changes to discuss with senior pharmacist prior to implementation and with advice from GP if necessary.
- Liaise with community pharmacists and patients to communicate changes to medication and ensure safe ongoing care.
Person specification
Qualifications
Essential criteria- Masters degree in Pharmacy (MPharm) or equvalent (BPharm)
- Completion of or Exemption from CPPE Primary Care Pathway
- Completion of Primary Care Clinical Diploma
- An appreciation of the nature of general practices and Primary Care
Registration
Essential criteria- Mandatory registration with General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC)
- Membership of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society
- Membership of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society
- A member of or working towards Faculty membership of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society
Experience
Essential criteria- Minimum of 3 years post-qualification experience
- Previous Experience in working in a Primary Care Setting
- An appreciation of the nature of GPs and general practices
- Understanding of the evidence-based principles of healthcare
skills and knowlegde
Essential criteria- Excellent written and verbal communication skills
- Understanding of the evidence-based principles of healthcare
- Excellent interpersonal, influencing and negotiating skills
- Able to plan, manage, monitor, advise and review general medicine optimisation issues in core areas for long term conditions
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RECRUITMENT EQUALITY STATEMENT
We are committed to equal opportunities and want to ensure our workforce is representative of the population we serve. We welcome applications from all sections of the community and diverse groups. It is essential we understand our demographics, in order that we can monitor our performance as an equal opportunity employer, as well as continuing to embed a culture of inclusivity across the organisation, which supports the active participation and contribution of our diverse staff groups in the Trusts decision making processes .
On application the shortlisting manager will not see this criterion and therefore it cannot be part of their decision making. Please ensure you complete your equal opportunities questions for us and help us to make sure everyone is welcome.
The Trust is committed to employing and supporting people with disabilities. It is the Trust’s policy to interview all candidates with a disability who meet the minimum ‘essential’ criteria as identified on the person specification. To ensure we know you have a disability, please inform us under the appropriate section on the application form.We welcome applications from the LGBTQ+ community and openly encourage people with different sexual orientation, gender identity and expression to apply to join our team. We promise to respect and encourage the use of all pronouns and will not purposefully mis-gender anyone.
We are governed by the public sector equality duties and by our values of Care, Respect and Responsibility to ensure we eliminate discrimination, harassment, victimisation and any other behaviour that is unlawful, undermines our core values and/or falls short of our Behaviour Framework.We want all of our staff to ‘call out’ any behaviour from colleagues, patients or visitors that constitutes the above and appropriate action be taken.
We will, at every opportunity, advance equality and inclusivity for all staff, at all levels within the organisation, by removing or minimising disadvantage, encouraging participation and taking all relevant steps to meet the needs of anyone who shares a protected characteristic.We will also foster good relations between persons who share a protected characteristic by tackling prejudice and promoting understanding at every opportunity.
We have staff Networks in place to help support staff experience of diverse staff groups and inform us on the actions, interventions and support what we need to put in place to improve the working lives and daily experiences of all colleagues and all teams.Anyone can join the networks and we take pride in having Allies as part of every network within the organisation.
By submitting an application for a position with this organisation, you are declaring that the information given is true and complete, any deliberate omission, falsification or misrepresentation will be grounds for rejecting the application or subsequent dismissal, and where applicable, for positions that requires registration with a professional body, you authorise us to make the required employer checks on your professional registration status.
Applicants are advised to apply early as if a large number of applications are received for this post we reserve the right to close the vacancy prior to the advertised date. Please note, preference will be given to at risk employees.
Applicants MUST ensure that they provide details of their referees and their referee email addresses on their application form otherwise their application may not be considered.
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