Pharmacy Technician in Hassocks

The post holder will work across the practices with each of the practice teams and will be assigned a lead clinical and operational contact for each contract. This post is part of the Additional Roles Reimbursement Scheme for Primary Care Networks funded by NHS England and includes funded access to the Primary Care Pharmacy Education pathway pilot for pharmacy technicians. The ambition is 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.

The post holder is a Pharmacy technician, who acts within their professional boundaries, supporting pharmacists in general practice to ensure effective and efficient use of medicines. In this role they will be supervised by a pharmacist who will develop, manage and mentor them. The Pharmacy technician's core role responsibilities will cover clinical, technical and administrative categories.

Main duties of the job include:

• Working as part of a multi-disciplinary team to provide technical support for the pharmacy service to ensure professional operational standards and excellence in pharmaceutical care and safety are maintained.
• Supporting the practices within Burgess Hill & Villages PCN to ensure the delivery of safe, effective and efficient systems for medicines related clinical correspondence; repeat prescribing, medicines optimisation, reducing medicines waste and maximising patient outcomes.
• Supporting training and development of administrators to support safe, effective and efficient processes involving medicines with a particular focus on repeat prescribing processes.
• Providing support to general practice staff and patients regarding prescription and medication queries.
• Developing and improving repeat prescribing & medicines reconciliation processes and systems for safer prescribing.
• Ensuring that the service is integrated with community and hospital pharmacy to improve patient outcomes.
• Working closely with the CCG Medicines Optimisation teams, community pharmacists and hospital pharmacy teams to support an integrated approach to prescribing and medicines optimisation.

Job responsibilities include:

• Clinical: Undertaking patient facing and patient supporting roles to ensure effective medicines use, through shared decision-making conversations with patients.
• Carrying out medicines optimisation tasks including effective medicine administration (e.g. checking inhaler technique), supporting medication reviews and medicines reconciliation.
• Utilising consultation skills to work in partnership with patients to ensure they use their medicines effectively.
• Supporting medication reviews and medicines reconciliation for new care home patients and synchronising medicines for patient transfers between care settings.
• Providing expertise to address both the public health and social care needs of patients, including lifestyle advice and service information.
• Managing shared care protocols and liaising with Clinical Pharmacists for more complex patients.
• Supporting initiatives for antimicrobial stewardship to reduce inappropriate antibiotic prescribing locally.

Technical and Administrative responsibilities include:

• Supporting the PCN multi-disciplinary team to ensure efficient medicines optimisation processes are being followed.
• Implementing efficient ordering and return processes and reducing medication wastage.
• Providing training and support on the legal, safe and secure handling of medicines.
• Developing relationships with other pharmacy professionals and members of the multidisciplinary team to support integration across health and social care.
• Supporting practice reception teams in streaming general prescription requests.
• Supporting the implementation of national prescribing policies and guidance within GP practices.

Benefits include:

• Generous annual leave allowance.
• Access to NHS pension.
• Bespoke training programme.
• Cycle to Work Scheme.
• Employee Assistance Programme.
• Enhanced maternity pay.
• NHS discounts.
• Leadership Development Programme.
• Salary sacrifice schemes technology and electric vehicle.
• Opportunities for secondments.

There are opportunities for a study leave allowance. Regular supervisions on a one-to-one basis including an annual formal appraisal are held with a line manager. An in-depth induction programme will be provided.

Person Specification includes:

• Essential skills: Computer literate, attention to detail, excellent verbal and written communication skills, influencing and negotiating skills.
• Desirable experience: Evidence of continued professional development (CPD).
• Essential knowledge: Relevant theoretical and practical knowledge of Primary Care Networks, good clinical pharmacy knowledge, understanding of pharmacy law and ethics.
• Essential qualifications: Professional registration with GPhC, BTEC/NVQ level 3 or equivalent in pharmaceutical sciences.
• Essential attributes: Works effectively independently and as a member of a team, flexible approach, self-motivated and proactive.

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and will require a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.