Clinical Pharmacist

Job summary

We are looking for an experienced Clinical Pharmacist to join our growing medicines management team at our busy surgery in the centre of Ely.

Ideally we are seeking a full-time pharmacist, but we are prepared to be flexible for the right candidate.

The ideal candidate would be expected to demonstrate the following characteristics:-

*To be able to organise, plan and prioritise workload on own initiative.

*To be able to work well under pressure, and meet agreed deadlines.

*To have excellent written and oral communication skills.

*The ability to maintain effective working relationships and to promote collaborative practice with all colleagues.

*To identify risk and assess/manage risk when working with individuals.

*Be committed to reducing health inequalities and proactively working to reach people from all communities.

*Be committed to engaging with organisational policies, including safe working practices, mandatory training and supervision and appraisal.

*Have the willingness to work flexibly when needs of service, or patients, require.

Main duties of the job

The role will involve a mix of direct patient-facing work and supporting our clinical practice team(s). The details below, whilst not covering all of the areas of the role, provide a reasonable overview of what tasks would be expected to be undertaken:

Contact patients by telephone or secure electronic means (eg, email via AskmyGP) and offer advice and support to patients who have questions, queries and concerns about their medicines. Conduct face to face appointments with patients as required. Supporting our medicines management colleagues based at the surgery. Conducting medication reviews and medicines optimisation. Receive on-the-day referrals for patients needing advice and guidance, and referrals from Practice colleagues. Advise on management of common, minor, self-limiting ailments and advice on over the counter medications available. Provide education and training to Practice teams, Care Home teams, and patient groups on therapeutics and medicines optimisation. Reconcile medicines following discharge from hospitals, intermediate care, and admissions to Care Homes. Identification of cohorts of patients at high risk of harm from medicines using clinical databases. Undertake clinical audits and analyse, interpret and present medicines data. Summarise and communicate key prescribing updates and medicines alerts. Support implementation of local and national guidelines and formulary recommendations. Monitor Practice prescribing against the local dashboards.

About us

We are based in our lovely, newly redeveloped premises in central Ely which was completed in the summer of 2023. We are a team of 3 Partners, 6 salaried GPs, 3 ANP/ACPs, 1 Clinical Nurse Manager, 12 Practice Nurses, 7 HCAs, supported by experienced Practice, Assistant Practice and IT managers alongside an excellent dispensary, referrals and patient services teams who recognise the pressures of the clinical team and work hard to support them.

We are very fortunate to have our PCN staff working with us and these include a physio, clinical pharmacists, medical technician, social prescriber, health and well-being coaches and a drug and alcohol support worker.

It is important to us as a Practice that we work in a supportive environment where we balance the need of providing excellent patient care with the wellbeing of our team.

If this sounds interesting then we would love to hear from you

Job description

Job responsibilities

Key duties and responsibilities

Support PCN Pharmacy Technicians and in house Med Techs. Clinical medication reviews. Clinical medication reviews for people who live in Care Homes. Patient-facing clinics for people living with long-term conditions. Receive on-the-day referrals for patients needing advice and guidance. Receive referrals from Practice colleagues, or direct from patients. Contact patients by telephone or secure electronic means (eg, email via askmyGP) and offer advice and support to patients who have questions, queries and concerns about their medicines. Management of common/minor/self-limiting ailments. Medicine information to practice staff and patients. Signposting. Repeat prescribing. Offer support, education and training to others. Support reduction in unplanned hospital admissions. Management of medicines after discharge from hospital. Reconcile medicines following discharge from hospitals, intermediate care, and admissions to Care Homes. Support public health campaigns. Safety netting in all contact with patients, check for interactions, contraindications, and red flags and offer safety-netting advice and follow-up where appropriate. Risk stratification and identification of cohorts of patients at high risk of harm from medicines using clinical databases (SystmOne, Ardens, Eclipse etc). Information management, contemporary research and service development. Analyse, interpret and present medicines data to highlight issues and risks to support decision making. Medicines quality improvement and medicines safety. Undertake clinical audits of prescribing in areas directed by the GPs, feedback the results and implement changes in conjunction with the relevant practice team. Implement changes to medicines that result from MHRA alerts, product withdrawal and other local and national guidance. Work with the general practice team to ensure we are compliant with CQC standards where medicines are involved. Support Practices with CQC inspections. Communicating key updates to Practice colleagues. Offer support to ensure that our system of communicating and recording alerts and significant events is robust. Support implementation of local and national guidelines and formulary recommendations. Monitor Practice prescribing against the local dashboards. Collaborative working. The post holder will be expected to participate in multi-disciplinary team meetings when required. Utilise and demonstrate sensitive communication styles, to ensure patients are fully informed and give consent. Use electronic communication platforms (email, SystmOne, Microsoft Teams and so on) to communicate effectively with colleagues and other organisations. Professional development and mandatory training. Engage with clinical supervision, and managerial supervision to enable you to deal effectively with the difficult issues that people present. Keep up to date with relevant clinical practice and demonstrate a contemporary understanding of relevant local and national policies and guidelines, and updates to these. Professional registration. The post-holder will need to be a qualified Pharmacist, registered with the General Pharmaceutical Council. It is the post-holders responsibility to ensure their registration is up to date, or flag any issues to their line manager. Medio-legal indemnity arrangements will be funded, but it is the post-holders responsibility to ensure that cover is up-to-date and of the required level, and that they do not work outside the scope of Practice, indemnity, or competency. The post-holder will take responsibility for their own health and safety and wellbeing, and take reasonable steps to ensure the same for other persons, including acts of omission. Communicate, in a timely manner, any concerns about risk. The post-holder will ensure they are up to date with mandatory training around risk (Infection control, moving and handling, Basic Life Support etc). Confidentiality Safeguarding. The post-holder has a responsibility to make all reasonable efforts to safeguard adults and children at risk, and promote their welfare, by following the practice policy, keeping up to date with training and learning, and communicating issues of concern urgently. Equality and diversity. The post-holder will support the equality, diversity and rights of patients, carers and colleagues. Variation. Duties may vary from time to time, without changing the general character of the post or the level of responsibility. Person Specification

Qualifications

Essential

- Ability to organise, plan and prioritise workload on own initiative. - Adaptable and resilient. - Able to work well under pressure, and meet agreed deadlines. - Demonstrates personal accountability, and is able to recognise personal limitations and ask for support / refer to more appropriate colleagues when necessary. - Excellent written and oral communication skills. - Adapts communication styles and interpersonal skills to best gain the cooperation of relevant stakeholders (including patients, senior and peer colleagues, and other professionals, other NHS/private organisations, CCGs). - Ability to maintain effective working relationships and to promote collaborative practice with all colleagues. - Ability to identify risk and assess/manage risk when working with individuals. - Committed to reducing health inequalities and proactively working to reach people from all communities. - Committed to engaging with organisational policies, including safe working practices, mandatory training and supervision and appraisal. - Willingness to work flexibly when needs of service, or patients, require.

---