Pharmacy Assistant

The role comprises of 2 days at St Michaels Hospital in Hayle and 3 days at Royal Cornwall Hospital and to cover West Cornwall Hospital when needed.

We are looking for a Pharmacy Assistant to join our team of support staff at the Royal Cornwall Hospital. Duties are varied and will include visiting wards and departments to review and order their ward stock.

Provide customer care at the Pharmacy hatch and carry out dispensing for inpatients and outpatients across a wide range of specialties, putting the patient first and delivering the best possible service.

You should have great communication and interpersonal skills; be motivated, flexible, adaptable and able to work well in an environment of change and transition. You will be expected to develop good working relationships with other staff within Pharmacy and the hospital.

This is a development post where the individual will complete a comprehensive apprenticeship training programme to develop the knowledge, skills and competence in Pharmacy Services

You will need to have a good standard of education and GCSEs or equivalent at Grade 4 or above in Maths and English. Excellent communication skills are a key requirement of this post. Full training will be provided.

To perform activities within dispensary

To ensure that all customers and telephone calls are attended to promptly in a friendly manner and referred on appropriately

Receive prescriptions according to current procedures through the prescription tracking system

To generate labels using the pharmacy computer system, to ensure the appropriate issues points are charged and patients have adequate directions for taking their medication

To ensure records are correctly maintained using the pharmacy computer system and paper records are archived according to Pharmacy Archive Procedure

To perform reception duties including dealing with patients and NHS staff enquiries either face to face or by telephone therefore good communication skills are essential.

To dispense medicines in accordance with standard operating procedures under the supervision of the responsible pharmacist ensuring that stock levels are correctly maintained on the JAC system

To carry out routine stock checks and expiry date checks and ensure stock is rotated according to procedure

To ensure accuracy of work at all stages of the dispensing process and to pass the South West Dispensing Accuracy Assessment every 2 years

To use the automated dispensing machine as required by the department

To maintain a clean, safe working environment by participating in the daily, weekly cleaning and tidying of dispensary

To perform all activities in accordance with training and departmental standard operating procedures

Sustainability is integral to the Trust achieving the NHS Net Zero target. All staff are therefore actively encouraged and supported to implement new ways of working within their field of expertise.

To work as a member of a team of assistants, providing support to a wide range of pharmacy activities.
These activities include the labelling of inpatient and outpatient prescriptions in dispensary and reception duties.
The supply of medicines to wards, clinics and outside hospitals.
To participate in pharmacy top-up activities out on the wards
To assist the ward based pharmacy and nursing team by facilitating the movement of patient specific medicines throughout the hospital.
Participate in signposting the appropriate patients to a community pharmacy services at discharge.
To work as a member of a team of assistants, providing support to a wide range of pharmacy activities.
To assist with the returning of medications into stock