Clinical Pharmacist

Job responsibilities

Primary Responsibilities

• The post holder will work alongside our current Medicines Management Team in developing, promoting and implementing the high quality, evidence based and cost effective use of medicines in primary care in a way that maximises the benefits of medicines to patients and which minimises risks (clinical, legal and financial).
• The post holder will be required to develop, support and implement agreed prescribing and pharmaceutical activities or programmes.

Key Responsibilities:

• Patient-Facing Clinical Medication Review
• Undertake clinical medication reviews with patients and work within your scope of practice to implement any necessary changes reviews could be cohort based, in care homes, polypharmacy, within the pharmacists competence. Home visits may be required.
• To lead and coordinate medicines optimisation services and clinical pharmacy development to improve quality of care, personalised care and patient experience. Provide clinical leadership to ensure high quality and cost effective prescribing.

Medicines Quality Improvement

• Undertake clinical audits of prescribing in areas identified by yourself or as directed by the GPs, feedback the results and implement changes in conjunction with the relevant practice team.
• Identify cohorts of patients at high risk of harm from medicines through computer searches. This might include risks that are patient related, medicine related, or both. Put in place changes to reduce the prescribing of these medicines to high-risk patient groups.
• Identify, plan, organise, and co-ordinate the implementation of medicines optimisation initiatives, objectives and complex changes at GP practice to bring about quality improvements in prescribing behaviour and better outcomes for patients including reducing patient harm and improving medication safety. Lead the development and implementation of new medicines optimisation initiatives and services within the PCN, community pharmacies and community providers. This includes the development of prescribing / medicines optimisation guidelines and protocols.

Medicines Safety

• Implement changes to medicines that result from MHRA alerts, product withdrawal and other local and national guidance.
• Provide specialised advice and support in risk management and clinical governance issues and ensure compliance with medicines legislation, patient safety advisory notices and other established good practices to manage and minimise risk. This may include supporting the dispensary teams within each practice.

Leadership and Management

• As a Clinical Pharmacist you will be expected to contribute to the leadership of medicines-related issues, and to provide leadership and mentoring to clinical pharmacists, pharmacy technicians and dispensary staff employed by the Practice.
• Provide leadership in supporting further integration of general practice with wider healthcare systems (including hospital and community pharmacy) to help improve patient outcomes, ensure better access to healthcare and help manage general practice workload.
• Provide leadership on person centred medicines optimisation (including ensuring prescribers in the practice conserve antibiotics in line with local antimicrobial stewardship guidance) and quality improvement, whilst contributing to the quality and outcomes framework and enhanced services.
• Demonstrate understanding of governance and be able to implement this appropriately within the workplace.
• Demonstrate understanding of, and contribute to, the workplace vision.
• Demonstrate ability to improve quality within limitations of service.
• Review progress yearly and develop clear plans to achieve results within priorities set by others.
• Demonstrate ability to motivate self to achieve goals.
• Demonstrate ability to provide support to other clinical pharmacists, pharmacy technicians and dispensary staff.
• Demonstrate understanding of the implications of national priorities.
• Demonstrate understanding of the process for effective resource utilisation.
• Demonstrate understanding of, and conform to, relevant standards of practice.
• Demonstrate ability to identify and resolve risk management issues according to policy/protocol.
• Follow professional and organisational policies/procedures relating to performance management.
• Demonstrate ability to extend boundaries of service delivery within the team.
• Mentor a team of differing abilities.
• Work autonomously with significant discretion and work collaboratively with a wide range of internal and external stakeholders.
• Management of Common/Minor/Self-Limiting Ailments

Patient-Facing Medicines Support

• Provide patient facing clinics, telephone calls and video consultations for those with questions, queries and concerns about their medicines in the practice.
• Analyse and interpret complex information and communicate this information using a variety of methods to patients carers and other health professionals to promote the safe, high quality and cost-effective use of medicines in all prescribing decisions.

Management of Medicines at Change of Care Setting

• Reconcile medicines following discharge from hospital or admission to intermediate care or care homes, including identifying and rectifying unexplained changes and working with patients and community pharmacists to ensure patients receive the medicines they need post discharge. Set up and manage systems to ensure continuity of medicines supply to high-risk groups of patients (e.g. those with medicine compliance aids or those in Care Homes).
• Medicine Information to Practice Staff and Patients
• Answer relevant medicine-related enquiries from network staff along with external healthcare teams (e.g. community pharmacy) and patients with queries about medicines. Suggest and recommend solutions. Provide follow up when necessary to monitor the effect of any changes.

Drug Monitoring

• Ensure robust systems are in place for drug monitoring, streamlining these where beneficial.
• Repeat Prescribing
• Ensure the surgery has a robust repeat prescribing policy. You may be asked to contribute to the repeat prescribing reauthorisation process by reviewing patient requests for repeat prescriptions and reviewing medicines reaching review dates.
• Ensure patients have appropriate monitoring in place when required.

Service Development

• Contribute pharmaceutical advice for the development and implementation of new services that have medicinal components (e.g. advice on treatment pathways and patient information leaflets).
• Support prescribers and practices to both maintain financial balance within their allocated prescribing budgets and ensure financial viability of the dispensaries.

Information Management

• Analyse, interpret and present medicines data to highlight issues and risks to support decision making.
• Produce timely reports and papers, updating databases on benefits/outcomes of services, using relevant appropriate IT packages where required including excel, project management tools. This should be carried out to agreed criteria and plans developed for correcting mitigating circumstances if targets not achieved.
• Attend and contribute to practice, PCN and CCG Clinical Meetings when relevant.
• Liaise with prescribing colleagues across East Suffolk in primary and secondary care to ensure consistency with local prescribing strategies including working with secondary care to reduce the impact of inappropriate secondary care influenced prescribing.

Location of Work

The postholder will work at Saxmundham Health Surgery and at times in other locations within the PCNs boundary and its surrounding areas. There is also the possibility of working remotely from home.

Personal Qualities

Essential

• Polite and confident
• Flexible and cooperative
• Motivated
• Forward thinker
• High levels of integrity and loyalty
• Sensitive and empathetic in distressing situations
• Ability to work under pressure

Other Requirements

Essential

• Flexibility to work outside of core office hours
• Disclosure Barring Service (DBS) check
• Evidence of continuing professional development

Qualifications

Essential

• GPhC Registered Pharmacist
• Completion of General Pharmacists Training Pathway

Desirable

• GPhC Independent Prescriber Qualification
• Minor Ailments certification
• Medicines Management Qualification
• MUR and repeat dispensing certification

Experience

Essential

• Minimum of two years working as a pharmacist
• Experience in managing pharmacy services in primary care

Desirable

• Broad knowledge of General Practice

Skills

Essential

• Excellent communication skills (written and oral)
• Strong IT skills
• Clear, polite telephone manner
• Competent in the use of Office and Outlook
• SystmOne Skills
• Ability to promote best practice regarding all pharmaceutical matters
• Effective time management (Planning & Organising)
• Ability to work as a team member and autonomously
• Good interpersonal skills
• Problem solving & analytical skills
• Ability to follow policy and procedure

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

UK Registration

Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).