PCN Senior Clinical Pharmacist

Lakeside Healthcare Group; Peterborough; On-site; GBP 40,000 - 60,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading healthcare provider in the UK is seeking a dedicated Senior Clinical Pharmacist to enhance patient care within primary healthcare. The role emphasizes optimizing medicines use and supporting chronic disease management. Responsibilities include conducting medication reviews, overseeing prescription processes, and mentoring a pharmacy team. Candidates should hold a GPhC registration and have substantial experience in primary care settings. This position promises an opportunity to lead in a supportive, diverse healthcare environment.

Qualifications

• Registered with the General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC).
• Postgraduate Diploma in Clinical Pharmacy.
• Minimum of 2 years leadership or mentoring experience in Primary Care.

Responsibilities

• Conduct structured medication reviews.
• Oversee the repeat prescription authorisation process.
• Support patient triage and manage acute prescription requests.

Job description

Are you passionate about improving patient care and making a real impact in primary healthcare?

We are looking for a dedicated and forward-thinking Senior Clinical Pharmacist to join our general practice team. This is an exciting opportunity to work at the heart of patient care, helping to optimise medicines use, support long-term condition management, and improve the safety and effectiveness of prescribing across a diverse patient population, whilst supporting the mentorship and development of a growing pharmacy team.

Youll work as part of a supportive, multi-disciplinary team in a role that offers variety, autonomy, and the chance to lead on clinical initiatives. Whether reviewing medication for older adults, advising on treatment pathways, or reducing hospital readmissions, your expertise will be central to delivering high-quality, patient-centred care.

If youre looking to take the next step in your career and want to be part of an innovative and evolving healthcare environment, wed love to hear from you.

The Senior PCN Clinical Pharmacist will participate in patient triaging, conduct structured medication reviews, oversee the repeat prescription authorisation process, manage acute prescription requests, perform medicines reconciliation during care transfers, and lead the implementation of systems to enhance prescribing safety within the PCN. The Senior PCN Clinical Pharmacist will also be responsible for managing one or more areas of chronic disease.

Main duties of the job

• Medication Safety Reviews
• Structured Medication Reviews
• Medication Queries
• Acute Prescription Requests
• Chronic Disease Management
• Management of common/minor/self-limiting ailments
• Medicine information to practice staff and patients
• Unplanned hospital admissions
• Medicines Safety/Quality alerts and auditing
• Implementation of local and national guidelines and formulary recommendations
• Leadership and Management

In addition to these clinical duties, the Senior PCN Clinical Pharmacist will be expected to mentor and develop a pharmacy team with varying levels of experience to support the strategic objectives for medicines management within Rockingham Forest PCN and Lakeside Healthcare.

About us

LAKESIDE HEALTHCAREis 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.

Values

Caring & Respect:Simply put we genuinely care about people: working together for our patients and our teams, our patients come first in everything we do.

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 PCNis a large, forward-thinking Primary Care Network compromising 3 practices across Corby, Kettering and Oundle.

This role is based across Corby, Kettering and Oundle.

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. For more information on primary care networks please visit https://www.england.nhs.uk/primary-care/primary-care-networks/

Job responsibilities

Supporting the overarching Lakeside Healthcare strategy and service delivery, the Senior PCN Clinical Pharmacist will have previous experience of working in primary care to develop and implement medicines management services in primary care.

The role is pivotal to improving the quality of care and operational efficiencies so requires motivation and passion to deliver excellent service within general practice.

The post holder will work collaboratively with a range of multidisciplinary teams to meet the needs of patients, support the delivery of policies and procedures, and provide pharmacy leadership across our Primary Care Networks (PCN).

The Senior PCN Clinical Pharmacist will support patient triage, oversee the repeat prescription authorisations, manage acute prescription requests, conduct medicines reconciliation at transfer of care, perform structured medication reviews, and lead on the implementation of systems for safer prescribing within the PCN.

The Senior PCN Clinical Pharmacist will also be expected to manage one or more areas of chronic disease.

In addition to the clinical responsibilities outlined above, the Senior PCN Clinical Pharmacist will be required to mentor and develop a pharmacy team of differing abilities to meet the strategic objectives for medicines management within Lakeside Healthcare.

To work at this level, the post holder will be registered with the General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC), be an independent prescriber, and ideally hold a postgraduate diploma in clinical pharmacy.

The postholder will also have a minimum of 2 years of leadership and management experience within primary care and understand the challenges and opportunities of working in a super-practice and its associated Primary Care Networks.

In summary, the postholder is an experienced Clinical Pharmacist who understands the expectations of a medicines management team within general practice, is able to manage, mentor and develop pharmacists and technicians, acts within their professional boundaries, ensures that the PCN integrates with community and hospital pharmacy to help utilise skill mix, is keen on implementing medicines safety initiatives, strives to improve patient access to healthcare, and is passionate about reducing the medicines related GP workload.

KEY DUTIES & RESPONSIBILITIES

Medication Queries

• Provide telephone consultations for patients with medication queries

Acute Prescription Requests

• Manage acute prescription requests from patients and sign prescriptions for a broad range of drugs as an independent prescriber.

Medicine Information to practice staff and patients

• Answer relevant medicine related enquiries from GPs, other practice staff, other healthcare teams (e.g. community pharmacy) and patients with queries about medicines

Medication Safety Reviews

• Undertake medication safety reviews of medical notes to ensure repeat prescribing is safe and arrange relevant monitoring where required.
• 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.
• Setup and/or 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).
• Partake in MDTs to develop and implement pharmaceutical care plans.

Management of common/minor/self‑limiting ailments

• Manage a 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.
• Identify national and local policy and guidance related to medicines that affect patient safety. Implement changes to medicines that result from MHRA alerts, product withdrawal and other local and national guidance.
• Undertake clinical audits of prescribing in areas directed by the ICB and the LHG audit programme, and implement changes in conjunction with the practice team.
• To ensure the processes for monitoring high‑risk drugs is effective within the PCN.

Unplanned hospital admissions

• Review the use of medicines most associated with unplanned hospital admissions and re‑admissions through audit and individual patient reviews.
• Put in place changes to reduce the prescribing of these medicines to high‑risk patient groups.

Structured Medication Reviews

• Undertake Structured Medication Reviews in‑line with the PCN DES and implement own prescribing changes as an independent prescriber.

Chronic Disease Management

• Independently manage or signpost patients with single or multiple medical problems where medicine optimisation is required (e.g. COPD, asthma)
• Provide pharmaceutical advice for the development and implementation of new services that have medicinal components (e.g. advice on treatment pathways and patient information leaflets)

Implementation of local and national guidelines and formulary recommendations

• Monitor practice prescribing against the local health economy’s formulary and guidelines and make recommendations to GPs for medicines that should be prescribed by hospital doctors (red drugs) or subject to shared care (amber drugs).
• Audit practices compliance against NICE technology assessment guidance.

Leadership and Management

• With support from the Digital & Transformation Manager, line manage a team of Pharmacist and Pharmacy Technicians
• Provide clinical mentoring and supervision for PCN Pharmacists and Technicians
• Support the development of new pharmacists and technicians to ensure they integrate into the clinical teams and work within their competence whilst also developing their scope of practice.

Operating arrangements

• Responsibility for one or more sites dependent upon patient list size.
• Working across the PCN geography, having a regular rota at all practices.
• 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 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.
• CQC audits; to aid compliance reporting and evidence collection.
• Attend and participate in practice meetings as required.
• Provide Pharmacy Placement/Education stakeholder engagement and support when opportunities arise.

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

Qualifications

• Registration with GPhC
• Postgraduate Diploma in Clinical Pharmacy
• Completion of CPPE
• Membership of Primary Care Pharmacy Association
• Membership of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society
• MSc in Advanced Clinical Practice (or working towards)

Experience

• Minimum of 2 years leadership or mentoring experience in Primary Care
• Minimum of 5 years of post‑registration experience
• Experience of working as a pharmacist in General Practice
• Understands the importance of working efficiently to ensure equitable access for patients
• Thorough understanding of the nature of primary care prescribing concepts of rational prescribing and strategies for improving prescribing
• An understanding of the nature of a super‑practice in relation to Primary Care Networks

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.