Pharmacy Technician

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 technicians core role responsibilities will cover clinical, technical and administrative categories.

Please note that if we receive a high volume of applications, the advert may close early.

Main duties of the job:

• The post holder will work as part of a multi-disciplinary team and this role involves provision of technical support for the pharmacy service to ensure professional operational standards and excellence in pharmaceutical care and safety are maintained.
• The role will support 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.
• The post holder will support training and development of administrators to support safe, effective and efficient processes involving medicines with a particular focus on repeat prescribing processes and will also provide support to general practice staff and patients regarding prescription and medication queries.
• They will also help to develop and improve repeat prescribing & medicines reconciliation processes and systems for safer prescribing.
• The post holder will ensure that the service is integrated with community and hospital pharmacy to improve patient outcomes.
• The pharmacy technicians will work closely with the CCG Medicines Optimisation teams, community pharmacists and hospital pharmacy teams to support an integrated approach to prescribing and medicines optimisation which works towards shared goals.

About Alliance for Better Care CIC:

Alliance for Better Care (ABC) is a GP Federation uniting 77 NHS GP member practices across 98 sites within 24 Primary Care Networks in Sussex and Surrey. We support our Primary Care colleagues and their patients to transform how healthcare is delivered in their communities. We work closely with GP Practices, PCNs, Hospitals, Community Organisations, and the Third Sector. These vital partnerships enable us to deliver a truly integrated approach that offers the support and expertise needed to effectively serve our populations.

About Burgess Hill and Villages PCN:

Burgess Hill and Villages Primary Care Network is an NHS collaboration between four GP practices - Brow Medical Centre, Meadows Surgery, Mid Sussex Health Care and Silverdale Practice - working together to provide enhanced access services. Our surgery teams work closely, sharing expertise and resources to develop new services. Our vision is to continue to improve the quality of care that we provide in alignment with the needs of our patient population. Our PCN builds on the existing primary care services and enables a greater provision of proactive, personalised and more integrated health and social care. We are supported by practitioners in additional roles who allow us to create bespoke multi-disciplinary teams based on the needs of our local population. By working together with local community services, this allows us to make support available to people where it is most needed.

Job responsibilities:

• Clinical: Undertake patient facing and patient supporting roles to ensure effective medicines use, through shared decision-making conversations with patients.
• 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.
• 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.
• Support the Clinical Pharmacist in Structured Medication Reviews (SMR) i.e. organise necessary monitoring tests prior to SMR.
• Provide expertise to address both the public health and social care needs of patients, including lifestyle advice, service information, and help in tackling local health inequalities.
• Manage shared care protocols and liaise with Clinical Pharmacists for more complex patients.
• Support initiatives for antimicrobial stewardship to reduce inappropriate antibiotic prescribing locally.

• Technical and Administrative: Support the PCN multi-disciplinary team to ensure efficient medicines optimisation processes are being followed.
• Support medications reconciliation for patients when they are discharged from hospital.
• Implement efficient ordering and return processes and reducing medication wastage.
• Provide training and support on the legal, safe and secure handling of medicines, including the implementation of the Electronic Prescription Service (EPS).
• Promotion of Electronic Repeat Dispensing (eRD) and online ordering.
• Develop relationships with other pharmacy professionals and members of the multidisciplinary team to support integration across health and social care including primary care, community pharmacy, secondary care and mental health.
• Support practice reception teams in streaming general prescription requests, so as to allow GPs and clinical pharmacists to review the more clinically complex requests.
• Support the implementation of national prescribing policies and guidance within GP practices, care homes and other primary care settings.
• Support the PCN to deliver on QIPP agenda, QOF and locally commissioned enhanced services.
• Support the PCN in reviewing and developing practice policies for CQC requirements.

Benefits:

• Generous annual leave allowance.
• Access to NHS pension.
• Bespoke training programme.
• Cycle to Work Scheme.
• Employee Assistance Programme.
• Enhanced maternity pay.
• NHS discounts.