Advanced Clinical Pharmacist for Acute Virtual Ward inPlymouth inPlymouth PUBLISHED MON 9 DEC 2024

Virtual Ward- Advanced Clinical Pharmacist

There is 1 WTE position (37.5 hours per week) available. Applications for full and part time working will be considered. No weekend, bank holiday or on call working. Hybrid working available.

Are you passionate about making a difference in the lives of people in our communities across Plymouth, the South Hams, and West Devon? Do you thrive in a dynamic and innovative healthcare environment? We have some very exciting opportunities to join our integrated acute Virtual Ward team. This project forms part of a wider plan to improve urgent and emergency healthcare delivery as well as step up and step up down care from the acute hospital.

We are committed to revolutionising healthcare delivery for patients. Our aim is to provide high-quality, patient-centred care in the comfort of their own homes, reducing length of hospital stay and admissions and enhancing overall well-being through enhanced care coordination.

The Role

As the Advanced Clinical Pharmacist, you will play a critical role in our multidisciplinary team, covering the expanded virtual ward that we have planned for our locality. The post holder will work closely with consultants, GPs, nurses, and other healthcare professionals to ensure seamless, integrated care on the virtual ward, by providing specialist medicines assessments and interventions for those admitted to the acute Virtual Ward.

This role may not be eligible for sponsorship under the Skilled Worker route.

Key Responsibilities

Leadership within the Virtual ward regarding medicines and medicines governance

Medicine reconciliation

Structured medication reviews including complex polypharmacy and deprescribing

Prescribing and accurate record keeping regarding medications

Answering medication queries raised by the multidisciplinary team and providing clinical support to the Virtual Ward Technician

Discharge facilitation

Our Approach to Recruitment

For an informal discussion about the role, please email

Interviews will take place at the Beauchamp Centre, Mount Gould Hospital. Successful candidates will be asked to bring in their documentation to enable the start of the pre-employment check phase as soon as they can post interview. If you are happy for this process to start prior to receiving the outcome of the interview, please bring with you:

Copies of any qualifications relevant to the role

Copies of training certificates -digital copies are acceptable

2 forms of photographic identification

3 forms of identification, to include your Right to Work documentation and 2 proof of address, ideally a printed bank statement from a Current Account- this will allow us to start pre-employment checks without delay.

Please note that we may close the job advertisement earlier than the specified deadline.

All staff are expected to be able and willing to work across a 7 day service.

About us

Clinical and Professional

To be responsible for and lead the provision of a high quality, specialised clinical pharmacy service to ensure the safe, clinically effective and cost-efficient use of medicines.

To be responsible for the delivery of the clinical pharmacy services to nominated areas, including attendance at consultant ward rounds, providing expert pharmaceutical advice and setting standards for junior pharmacists to emulate.

To be responsible for the provision of professional pharmaceutical advice to healthcare colleagues, patients, and carers as necessary.

To develop and monitor pharmacy initiatives such as medicines reconciliation on admission and provision of discharge summaries to GPs, which promote seamless transfer of patients from secondary care to primary care and vice versa.

To be responsible for the development of virtual based pharmaceutical care initiatives e.g. poly-pharmacy medication reviews, patient and carer counselling, discharge planning, assessing patient concordance and improved communication with primary care healthcare professionals.

To lead on and develop policy or service changes within Virtual Wards which improve ward or community services and be responsible for their implementation.

To promote and monitor compliance with the South and West Devon Joint Formulary and to assist in formulary applications and review for medicines relevant to patients within the Virtual Ward.

To be responsible for monitoring prescribing practice to promote cost-effective and economic use of resources and contribute to the establishment and implementation of prescribing guidelines within Virtual Wards.

To be lead on and be responsible for reporting and review of clinical and other pharmacy related audits within Virtual Wards.

To be responsible for the development of junior pharmacy staff within Virtual Wards including rotational pharmacists and trainee pharmacists.

To provide evidence of Continuing Professional Development on an annual basis at appraisal, in accordance with guidance issued by the General Pharmaceutical Council.

To cover for ward pharmacists as required, during periods of absence.

Occasional dispensary cover including dispensing and checking of medication following local SOPs.

Analytical and Judgemental Skills

Have highly developed skills for analysing medications, patient intimation in order to provide advice on medicines, dosages, production issues/ in areas where information and evidence is lacking, and medical or other opinion differs.

Clinical screening of prescription charts and discharge prescriptions, to ensure prescriptions are safe and appropriate.

Responding to and recording medicines information requests from prescribers and other healthcare professionals and providing advice on medicines proactively. In many cases this is a complex task involving highly specialist up to date knowledge, effective search strategies, evaluation of the evidence base and formulation of an appropriate response.

To be responsible for the investigation and monitoring of medicines related incidents relating to Virtual Wards, recommending and implementing change as required to improve patient safety, collating these for discussion at pharmacy team meetings and at the Medicines Governance Group.

Clinical Governance

To be responsible for and lead on clinical governance and risk management through interventions which optimise the management of medicines in Virtual Wards, supporting best practice throughout all areas of responsibility

To participate in and lead multidisciplinary groups in the review and development of selected medicines related policies and procedures relating to Virtual Wards and present to the MGG.

To lead on the development and review of documents e.g. Patient Group Directions, Policies, Guidelines and Protocols relating to Virtual Wards and presenting reviewed documents to the MGG and DTC.

To support professional leads in identifying and addressing evidence-based medicine practice consistent with the requirements of clinical governance and of national directives

To work with the Pharmacy Senior Management Team to lead on continuous quality improvement projects and audit within Virtual Wards

Managerial

To provide mentoring, training, supervision and line management of substantive and rotational pharmacists, pharmacy technicians and other pharmacy staff and students as required, including appraisals and performance reviews.

To organise the trainee pharmacist timetable when they rotate through Virtual Wards.

To act as Designated Supervisor to a Trainee Pharmacist annually as required.

To mentor/buddy other NMPs within Livewell SW.

To Act as a Designated Prescribing Practitioner, Educational supervisor or Practice Supervisor as appropriate for members of the team undertaking their independent prescribing training.

Freedom to Act

Pharmacists are expected to work largely unsupervised and to act on their own professional judgement.

Clinical supervision from another health professional can be arranged and is to be encouraged.

Technical roles are defined by standard operating procedures which should always be followed.

Clinical roles are supported by policies and guidelines within which the pharmacist is allowed professional discretion / interpretation.

This role includes setting the parameters under which other pharmacy staff will operate.

Training and Education

To lead on the training and development of pharmacy staff within Virtual Wards and support training of other staff members within the team as appropriate.

To plan, develop and deliver appropriate training and education to healthcare colleagues, carer groups and outside agencies to promote the safe use and clinical application of medicines.

To be responsible for and lead on the induction of new pharmacy staff within Virtual Wards.

To assist and lead, where appropriate, on the training provided to pharmacy students, trainee pharmacists and other pharmacy staff.

Health, Safety and Security

To work safely in the dispensary, ward, patient residence, and office environments ensuring any risks identified to health and safety are managed or escalated to line manager.

To ensure safety and security of medicines, prescription stationery and patient identifiable documents according to locally agreed standard operating procedures.

To inform line manager of any breaches of safety or security or if agreed procedures are thought to be inadequate to manage the risk.

Please refer to attachment for full job description.