Top tips for new prescribers working in Primary Care 19th May 2011

  • Order your prescription pads a minimum of 6 weeks in advance of your planned start date – see ‘PROCEDURE FOR ORDERING PHARMACIST PRESCRIPTION PADS FOR NEW PRESCRIBERS WORKING IN PRIMARY CARE’ on the NES Pharmacy website.
  • Ensure you receive an induction to the practice team together with their roles and responsibilities and identify what information the team require you to enter on the computer system e.g. readcodes.
  • Ensure you are familiar with the local non-medical prescribing policy and work in compliance with this.
  • Join the local non-medical prescribing network, where available, in your Health Board as a means of peer support and interprofessional working.
  • Liaise with other prescribing pharmacists who are already delivering clinics within the same clinical speciality to identify any potential problems before they arise.
  • Consider working as a supplementary prescriber in the first instance to build confidence in your practice and build relationships with medical prescribers.
  • If working as a supplementary prescriber prepare and agree a generic CMP for the patient group(s) you are delivering services with the medical team at the time you order your pads.
  • If working as an independent prescriber prepare and agree a personal prescribing formulary with the medical team to ensure you are prescribing within your competencies and to ensure clarity for all concerned.
  • Build preparation time into your clinic to allow you to review patient records prior to the patient consultation and ensure you have relevant patient information leaflets available.
  • Ensure you have at least one general practitioner that you can contact during your clinics to help with difficult patient specific issues or issues outwith your competence requiring referral.
  • Start slow! Set up 20 minute consultations and decrease the consultation time as you develop your practice rather than starting with 10 minute consultations and finding you continuously run over time.
  • Start slow! Working with patients one-one in a clinic can be very tiring and demanding initially. Start with 4-6 patient slots in a session and increase this upwards as you upskill.
  • Consider keeping your own records, confidentially and securely, to act as an aide memoire when the patient returns to you for follow up and to help audit your service.
  • Ensure you leave time to document the patient consultation in the medical record. Keeping your own record can be a useful prompt and will allow you to document in the medical record at the end of the clinic.
  • Have a system in place to double check your handwritten prescription with that entered on the electronic record.
  • Ensure a system is in place so that all tests or investigations you request are passed back to you for assessment and action. However, in the interests of patient safety, ensure a nominated GP colleague deals with test results requiring urgent action when you are not available.