Job responsibilities
Job Title:
Pharmacy Technician
Responsible
to: Lead Clinical
Pharmacist
Accountable
to: Lead Clinical
Pharmacist and the SDU Clinical Directors
Hours
of work: 37 per week
Job Scope
Clinical
Pharmacy in General Practice is part of an exciting programme of transformation
to develop a new model of care which addresses our ambition to deliver
person-centred, coordinated care across the district. The Clinical Pharmacy in
General Practice model is supported by the direction of national policy
including the Five Year Forward View and GP Forward View where there is a need
to better utilise the role of pharmacy within primary care to pro-actively help
patients stay safe and well and out of hospital as well as helping to reduce
the demands on general practice.
Pharmacy
technicians play an important role, complementing clinical pharmacists,
community pharmacists and other members of the PCN multi- disciplinary team.
Pharmacy technicians are different to clinical pharmacists as they are not able
to prescribe or make clinical decisions, instead working under supervision to
ensure effective and efficient use of medicines.
Pharmacy
technicians core role responsibilities will cover clinical, and technical and
administrative categories.
The
purpose of the role is to lead improvements to maximise safe, cost-effective
best practice in prescribing to improve the quality of patient care. The post
holder will help patients to get the best from their medicines by switching
medications to agreed and approved protocols, improving repeat prescribing
processes in General Practice, including promotion of repeat dispensing and
online ordering, minimising clinical risk and aiming to reduce wasted
medicines.
In
addition, the post holder will be responsible for encouraging the development
of better understanding of the principles of medicines optimisation throughout
the practice teams and promoting good practice in line with therapeutic
developments. This will involve assisting the PCN in achieving national
requirements, NICE implementation, and utilisation of medicines optimisation
initiatives.
Key Duties and
Responsibilities
Clinical
1.
Undertake patient facing and patient supporting roles to ensure effective
medicines use, through shared decision-making conversations with patients.
2.
Carry out medicines optimisation tasks including effective medicine
administration (e.g., checking inhaler technique), supporting medication
reviews and medicines reconciliation. Where required, utilise consultation
skills to work in partnership with patients to ensure they use their medicines
effectively.
3.
As determined by the PCN, support medication reviews and medicines
reconciliation for new care home patients and synchronising medicines for
patient transfers between care settings, linking with local community
pharmacies
4.
Support the Clinical Pharmacist in Structured Medication Reviews (SMR)
5.
i.e., organise necessary monitoring tests prior to SMR
6.
Provide expertise to address both the public health and social care needs of
patients, including lifestyle advice, service information, and help in tackling
health inequalities.
7.
Manage shared care protocols and liaise with Clinical Pharmacists for more
complex patients.
8.
Support initiatives for antimicrobial stewardship to reduce inappropriate
antibiotic prescribing locally.
Technical and Administrative
1.
Support the PCN multi-disciplinary team to ensure efficient medicines
optimisation processes are being followed.
2.
Implement efficient ordering and return processes and reducing medication
wastage.
3.
Provide training and support on the legal, safe, and secure handling of
medicines, including the implementation of the Electronic Prescription Service
(EPS).
4.
Promotion of Electronic Repeat Dispensing (eRD) and online ordering.
5.
Develop relationships with other pharmacy professionals and members of the
multi-disciplinary team to support integration across health and social care
including primary care, community pharmacy, secondary care, and mental health.
6.
Support practice reception teams in streaming general prescription requests, so
as to allow GPs and clinical pharmacists to review the more clinically complex
requests.
7.
Support the implementation of national prescribing policies and guidance within
GP practices, care homes and other primary care settings.
8.
Support the PCN to deliver on QIPP agenda, QOF and locally commissioned
enhanced services.
9.
Supporting quality improvement measures and contributing to the Quality and
Outcomes Framework and enhanced services.
10.Support
the PCN in reviewing and developing practice policies for CQC requirements.
Functional
Responsibilities
The
postholder will:
1.
Develop a culture that promotes equality and values diversity. The postholder
must be aware of and committed to the Equality and Diversity policies of the
appointing PCN and comply with all the requirements of these policies and
actively promote Equality and Diversity issues relevant to the post.
2. Ensure the principles of openness,
transparency and candour are observed and upheld in all working practices.
3. The post holder will have, or acquire
through training provided by the organisation, the appropriate level of
safeguarding and knowledge, skills and practice required for the post.
4.
be aware of and comply with the organisations safeguarding protection policies
and procedures.
5.
Ensure that any infection prevention and control issues are reported to the
line manager/Infection Prevention and Control.
Equality and diversity:
6.
The post-holder will support the equality, diversity and rights of patients,
carers, and colleagues, to include:
a. Acting in a way that recognises the
importance of peoples rights, interpreting them in a way that is consistent
with practice procedures and policies, and current legislation.
b. Respecting the privacy, dignity,
needs and beliefs of patients, carers, and colleagues.
c. Behaving in a manner which is
welcoming to and of the individual, is non-judgmental and respects their
circumstances, feelings priorities and rights.
Personal/Professional development:
7.
The post-holder will participate in any training programme implemented by the
practice as part of this employment, with such training to include:
a. Participation in an annual individual
performance review, including taking responsibility for maintaining a record of
own personal and/or professional development
b. Taking responsibility for own
development, learning and performance and demonstrating skills and activities
to others who are undertaking similar work
Quality:
8. The post-holder will strive to maintain
quality within the practice, and will:
a. Alert other team members to issues of
quality and risk.
b. Assess own performance and take
accountability for own actions, either directly or under supervision.
c. Contribute to the effectiveness of
the team by reflecting on own and team activities and making suggestions on
ways to improve and enhance the teams performance.
d. Work effectively with individuals in
other agencies to meet patients needs.
9.
Effectively manage own time, workload, and resources.
Supervision
The
postholder will have access to appropriate clinical supervision and an
appropriate named individual in the PCN to provide general advice and support
on a day-to-day basis.
