Pharmacy Technician

Job description

Job responsibilities

The Pharmacy Technician will support the medicine management role of the Clinical Pharmacist to deliver a safe, efficient and consistently effective General Practice model of care, including supporting and assisting a cluster of GP practices. 

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 practices, 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 GP Federation in achieving national requirements, NICE implementation and utilisation of medicines optimisation initiatives. We offer a supportive environment, our Clinical Pharmacist Team work closely together to improve patient care an experience. 

We host a monthly education forum which is shared learning environment created to support and continually develop the team. We aim to develop our Technicians’ skillset over time to perform clinical functions above and beyond those conventionally considered as part of the Technician GP Practice role. This might include training to perform phlebotomy and vaccination as examples once competent at core activities. 

 KEY TASKS AND RESPONSIBILITIES 

 • Support the role of the Clinical Pharmacist at PCN level on the delivery of medicines management in General Practice model 

 • Carry out medicines switches in GP practices in line with practice and CCG agreed specific protocols – reviewing patients’ records; amending records and informing patients 

 • Carry out housekeeping whilst in patient records e.g. dose optimisation and medicines synchronisation 

• Improve prescribing processes in general practice 

• Promotion of electronic repeat dispensing and online ordering 

• Report on key performance indicators for CPGP to demonstrate added value for patients and general practice in accordance with NICE guidance 

• Use and maintain information systems and databases relevant to the position including incident reporting, medicines optimisation, prescribing data, cost savings and patient outcomes 

• Work closely with GP practices and the Senior Clinical Pharmacists 

• Participate in practice meetings, patient participation groups, and other meetings to improve engagement of the role of pharmacy technician within the CPGP model and to promote issues relevant to prescribing and medicines optimisation 

• Liaise with other pharmacy stakeholders e.g. CCG Pharmacy team, community pharmacy, and hospital pharmacy teams. • Support Medicines Optimisation and the delivery of the Medicines Optimisation strategy

• Handle function specific information, which may be sensitive, complex or confidential and appropriately recording, transferring and/or coordinating such information in accordance with the Data Protection Act; Caldicott Guidelines and the Confidentiality Code of Conduct 

• To be responsible for the organisation, planning and of own workload to meet set deadlines 

 • To utilise SystmOne, the GP practice clinical systems to conduct prescribing audits 

• To undertake, participate and share the outcomes of clinical audits to facilitate improvement and changes in practice 

• As instructed by the CCG Pharmacist, ensure that all major MHRA drug alerts, where appropriate and within level of competence, are acted upon within practices over an appropriate time frame and to advise on any medication changes that occur as a result 

 • To assist in the monitoring of prescribing expenditure at individual practice level and propose changes to ensure containment within identified resource 

• To undertake learning and development to ensure the required knowledge and skills for practice based work 

• To carry out other duties which are appropriate to the skills and competencies of the post holder and grade of the post as the priorities of the service change General 

• Develop a culture that promotes equality and values diversity. The post holder must be aware of and committed to the Equality and Diversity policies of the organisation and comply with all the requirements of these policies and actively promote Equality and Diversity issues relevant to the post. 

• Ensure the principles of openness, transparency and candour are observed and upheld in all working practices. 

• 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 and be aware of and comply with the organisation’s safeguarding protection policies and procedures. 

 • Ensure that any infection prevention and control issues are reported to the line manager/Infection Prevention and Control The above list of job duties is not exclusive or exhaustive and the post holder will be required to undertake such tasks as may reasonably be expected within the scope and grading of the post. 

 KEY WORKING RELATIONSHIPS The post holder will be required to: 

• Maintain constructive relationships with a broad range of internal and external stakeholders, including: General Practice, Clinical Pharmacy Team, Central London CCG, participate in relevant internal and external working groups/projects, services, and initiatives which develop the role and the service within Central London.

Person Specification

Attributes

Essential

• Self-motivated and proactive
• Adaptability, flexibility and ability to cope with uncertainty and change
• Demonstrate ability to work in a busy environment; ability to deal with both urgent and important tasks and to prioritise effectively whilst also supporting others
• Excellent time keeping and prioritisation skills
• Continued commitment to improve skills and ability in new areas of work

Qualifications

Essential

• Qualified Pharmacy Technician with at least 2 years experience post qualification
• Registered Pharmacy Technician with GPhC

Experience

Essential

• Computer literate
• Post qualification experiences which evidences leadership and working effectively within a team
• Knowledge of medicines management and local improvement schemes such as prescribing improvement
• Evidence of quality improvement and audits
• Experience of working effectively as part of a team and independently

Desirable

• Experience of using SystmOne
• Relevant advanced theoretical and practical knowledge of general practice and evidence based medicine
• Experience of working in a GP practice

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).

Employer details

Employer name

Central London Healthcare

Address

1b Harewood Row

London

NW1 6SE

Employer's website

https://www.centrallondonhealthcare.co.uk/ (Opens in a new tab)