Medicines Management Pharmacy Technician

Job overview

Alder Hey in the park is one of the world’s leading children’s hospitals recognised as a Centre of Excellence for children with cancer, cardiac, spinal and brain disease, providing specialist treatment for children in the UK and from around the world.

We are recruiting specialist medicines management technicians to work in Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust.

We are seeking registered pharmacy technicians with a desire to provide fundamental patient focused pharmacy services. You need to be methodical, work accurately and be passionate about upholding Trust values in order to provide the best possible service.

This role involves working directly with patients, families and multi-disciplinary teams on inpatient wards as a medicines management technician also supporting inpatient, outpatient and oncology dispensaries when required.

Main duties of the job

Providing an efficient medicines management service to designated ward areas, with the particular emphasis on carrying out medicine reconciliation on patient admission, providing inpatient medication supplies as required, and preparing medication for patient discharge

Ensuring the best use of patients own medicines to reduce medicines wastage.

Supporting the multidisciplinary team in your designated ward area to ensure the safe and effective supply of medicines

Liaises with: Pharmacists, Nurses, Pharmacy Technical Staff, Doctors, Other Healthcare Professionals both internal and external to the Trust.

To be responsible for providing a safe, efficient, and accurate ward-based pharmacy service

• Complete medicines reconciliation for patients accurately and safely on admission
• To safely dispense and issue prescriptions to patients.
• To provide drug stock supplies to wards and departments using the automated drug storage systems where available.
• To review and supply medicines to patients on discharge from hospital
• To carry out final accuracy checks of clinically screened prescriptions dispensed by others.
• To provide complex information and advice to patients and carers on the use and supply of their medicines.
• To support and deliver departmental training packages to student pharmacy technicians, pharmacy technicians, Pre-registration pharmacists and pharmacy assistants.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Provide a Medicines Management service to designated ward areas, which involves following relevant Medicines Management procedures to deliver the service in a safe and effective manner.

Assess the suitability of patients own drugs for use when brought into the trust. ie-: Correct drug and directions  on label, expiry date and storage conditions, re-labelling if necessary and gaining patient consent for the use or destruction of medication brought into hospital.

Initiate supply of non-stock items for one-stop dispensing ie-: ordering medication labelled ready for discharge when appropriate and ensure that sufficient supplies of medication are available for each patient for their inpatient stay and comply with discharge arrangements.

Check for prescribing errors within the limits compatible with technician training and competence using own knowledge and relevant supporting literature bringing any discrepancies to the attention of a Pharmacist.

Be an accredited accuracy checking technician participating in the dispensing and final accuracy checking of prescriptions and dispensed medication at ward level and within the in-patient and out-patient dispensaries

Co-ordinate and plan the discharge medication, bringing together patients own drugs and newly dispensed items, discharge times and intervention data.

Respond promptly to any request via phone or bleep relating to patients discharge to ensure a rapid and safe discharge is facilitated.

Participate in dispensing systems at ward level through dispensing of pre-packs at ward level to ensure that there is no delay in a patient receiving their medicines.

To manage own workload at ward level by prioritising urgent discharge prescriptions, non-stock items and resupplies of medication

Provide advice, instruction, and counselling for patients/parents/carers regarding the use of the patients medications. Explain complex regimes ensuring patients/parents/carers understand their medication regimes including benefits of their medicines and possible side effects. There may be certain barriers to understanding, of a sensitive and/ or complex nature that will require resolution

To liaise with members of multidisciplinary teams to effectively deliver patient-focused pharmacy services. This may include discharge planning, requesting changes to prescriptions, further supply of medications in Primary care, repeat prescriptions, homecare, discussing concerns about patient compliance or future problems.

Participate in the ordering and supply of stock medicines to all wards. This includes the periodic review of stock par levels and assessment of ward stock profiles, medication expiry dates and storage conditions.