Three young pharmacists in Essex have signed up for a new type of first job - a two-year community/hospital pharmacy split rotation. Each will spend six months of the year working in community practice and six in a hospital.
Two hospital trusts and three local community pharmacies in the Basildon and Southend area are collaborating in the two-year scheme, which has support funding from the local education and training consortium.
Southend hospital trust's director of pharmacy (Mr Stephen Nice) says that the aim is to keep young pharmacists in the local manpower pool, and to build links between hospital and community pharmacy.
"It is the development of cross-sector working which matters," he told The Journal recently.
Each placement will comprise 25 per cent training time, and the new pharmacists will spend around a day a week working alongside experienced practice mentors. This on-site training will be backed up by distance learning, provided by Derby university.
Miss Tamsin Stevenson (senior pharmacist for education and training) said that the Derby distance learning course was chosen because of its flexibility. Students could start when they liked, and work at their own speed towards a certificate, a diploma or ultimately an MSc. The mix of modules was another plus, with business management and interface issues on the list as well as clinical skills. A third advantage was that a member of the Derby distance learning team lived in Essex, and could provide local support for tutorials.
The Derby multimedia distance learning course is available as a set of CDs, and runs on most modern computers.
Miss Stevenson is also a hospital teacher-practitioner in the pharmacy practice group at King's College London. Dr Imogen Savage, another member of group is evaluating the scheme. - Contributed
The photograph shows (left to right) Aly Hirani, Tamsin Stevenson, Stuart Chandler and Karen Rosenbloom (seated).