PCN Clinical Pharmacist in Peterborough

We are seeking a dedicated and professional Pharmacist to join our multidisciplinary team. This is a unique opportunity to contribute to a forward-thinking organisation within the Primary Care Network (PCN) framework. The PCN has already established excellent collaboration in delivering pharmacy provision to the many aspects of the DES within its locality. The post holder will help underpin and grow the team to move to working in line with the ever-evolving requirements of PCNs.

Our current team is complemented by 6 clinical pharmacists and 4 pharmacy technicians working across all sites. This role is a replacement within the team to continue to grow on the support and accessibility of our PCN and its patient population. The listed salary is part time equivalent (working 30 hours a week).

Main duties of the job

• Clinical Medicines Management: Provide expertise in clinical medicines management, including medication reviews and ensuring safe prescribing practices, especially during care transitions.
• Medication Reviews: Conduct remote or face-to-face structured medication reviews for patients, particularly those with polypharmacy, long-term conditions, or in care homes.
• Support for Patients: Offer patient-facing support, addressing medication queries and optimizing medication use to improve adherence and outcomes. Reconcile and manage medicines post-hospital discharge, ensuring continuity of care and addressing unexplained changes.
• Quality Improvement: Lead clinical audits and contribute to quality improvement initiatives, including adherence to local and national prescribing guidelines.
• Service Development: Provide pharmaceutical advice for creating and implementing new services with medicinal components. Review and improve the safety of medicines associated with unplanned hospital admissions and high-risk groups.
• Education and Guidance: Provide medication-related information to practice staff, healthcare teams, and patients, suggesting solutions and monitoring outcomes.
• Policy Implementation: Monitor compliance with local and national guidelines, assisting with practice formulary updates and adherence to NICE guidance. Collaborate with multidisciplinary teams, attending case conferences and contributing to the delivery of high-quality care.

About us

LAKESIDE HEALTHCARE is changing the face of primary care provision in England. We are bold, adventurous and ambitious and determined to thrive in uncertain times. We are the largest true partnership in the NHS and operate from various sites across the East Midlands. We serve the healthcare needs of over 170,000 patients across Northamptonshire, Lincolnshire & Cambridgeshire.

Our values

• Caring & Respect: We genuinely care about people: working together for our patients and our teams, our patients come first in everything we do. We strive to ensure we connect and respond to all needs with compassion, care and respect to improve the lives and wellbeing of the communities we serve.
• Teamwork & Quality: In all areas of our business we network, collaborate and learn from our Patients, Stakeholders and each another to ensure we are always striving to improve, making the right and best decisions to provide the best service.

Rockingham Forest PCN is a large, forward-thinking Primary Care Network compromising 3 practices across Corby, Kettering and Oundle. This role is based in Oundle Surgery. We recognise the value that this role can bring to our practices and our patients, and we look forward to growing our PCN team. Our aim is to provide exemplary patient care; finding innovative solutions in general practice to deliver the best care we can to our patients.

Job responsibilities

The post holder will work within their clinical competence as part of a multi-disciplinary team to provide expertise in clinical medicines management. This involves providing face to face structured medication reviews, managing long term conditions, ensuring safe prescribing at the transfer of care, implementing systems for safer prescribing, repeat prescription reauthorisation and dealing with acute prescription requests.

The post holder will perform face to face medication review of patients with polypharmacy, especially for older people, people in residential care homes and those with multiple comorbidities. The post holder will provide leadership on quality improvement and clinical audit, and manage some aspects of the Quality and Outcomes Framework. This role is pivotal to improving the quality of care and operational efficiencies so requires motivation and passion to deliver an excellent service within general practice. The post holder will be supported to develop their role to become a non-medical prescriber, if that qualification is not already held.

Patient Facing Long-Term Conditions Clinics: See where appropriate patients with single or multiple medical problems where medicine optimisation is required (e.g. COPD, asthma). Review the ongoing need for each medicine, a review of monitoring needs and an opportunity to support patients with their medicines taking ensuring they get the best use of their medicines i.e. medicines optimisation. Make appropriate recommendations to GPs for medicine improvement.

Patient facing Clinical Medication Review: Undertake clinical medication reviews with patients and produce recommendations for senior clinical pharmacist, nurses and/or GP on prescribing and monitoring.

Patient facing Care Home Medication Review: Undertake clinical medication reviews with patients and produce recommendations for the senior clinical pharmacist, nurses or GPs on prescribing and monitoring. Work with care home staff to improve safety of medicines ordering and administration.

Patient facing domiciliary clinical medication review: Undertake clinical medication reviews with patients and produce recommendations for the senior clinical pharmacists, nurses and GPs on prescribing and monitoring. Attend and refer patients to multidisciplinary case conferences.

Management of common minor self-limiting ailments: Managing caseload of patients with common/minor/self-limiting ailments while working within a scope of practice and limits of competence. Signposting to community pharmacy and referring to GPs or other healthcare professionals where appropriate. Provide patient facing clinics for those with questions, queries and concerns about their medicines in the practice.

Medicine Information to Practice Staff and Patients: Answers relevant medicine-related enquiries from GPs, other practice staff, other healthcare teams (e.g. community pharmacy) and patients with queries about medicines. Suggesting and recommending solutions. Providing follow up for patients to monitor the effect of any changes.

Unplanned Hospital admissions: Review the use of medicines most commonly associated with unplanned hospital admissions and readmissions through audit and individual patient reviews. Put in place changes to reduce the prescribing of these medicines to high-risk patient groups.

Management of medicines at discharge from hospital: To reconcile medicines following discharge from hospitals, intermediate care and into care homes, including identifying and rectifying unexplained changes and working with patients and community pharmacists to ensure patients receive the medicines they need post discharge. Set up and manage systems to ensure continuity of medicines supply to high-risk groups of patients (e.g. those with medicine compliance aids or those in care homes).

Service Development: Contribute pharmaceutical advice for the development and implementation of new services that have medicinal components (e.g. advice on treatment pathways and patient information leaflets). Undertake clinical audits of prescribing in areas directed by the GPs, feedback the results and implement changes in conjunction with the practice team.

Implementation of local and national guidelines and formulary recommendations: Monitor practice prescribing against the local health economy's RAG list and make recommendations to GPs for medicines that should be prescribed by hospital doctors (red drugs) or subject to shared care (amber drugs). Assist practices in seeing and maintaining a practice formulary that is hosted on the practices computer system. Auditing practices compliance against NICE technology assessment guidance.

Operating arrangements: Responsibility for one or more sites dependent upon patient list size. Based across one or more sites with the opportunity to work remotely from other sites. This is an evolving role and the responsibilities may augment over time in consultation with the post-holder. From time to time the post-holder may be required to work from other sites.

Other Tasks: Duties may be varied from time to time under the direction of the line manager dependent on current and evolving practice workload and staffing levels.

Other administration and professional responsibilities: Participate in the administrative and professional responsibilities of the practice team. Ensure appropriate items of service claims are made accurately, reporting any problems to the practice administrator. Ensure collection and maintenance of any required statistical information. Attend and participate in practice meetings as required.

Training and personal development: Maintain professional registration with the GPhC. If it is necessary to expand the role to include additional responsibilities, full training will be given.

Person Specification

• Registration as a Pharmacist with the General Pharmaceutical Council.
• Evidence of CPD.
• Completion of CPPE pathway, or working towards completion.
• Independent prescriber or working towards.
• Specialist knowledge acquired through postgraduate diploma level or equivalent training/experience.

Experience

• Evidence of CPD.
• Minimum of 2 years post-qualification experience.
• Experience of 1 year working in general practice.
• Membership of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society.
• A member of or working towards Faculty Membership of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society.
• Experience of working across multiple sectors of Pharmacy (Community Pharmacy, Hospital Pharmacy, CCGs, Industry).

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.

£39,248 to £40,953 a year Dependent on Experience/Qualifications