Pharmacists in “grey areas” will be advised on registration category
The chairman of the Society’s Education Committee is to make the final decision on advice for pharmacists and pharmacy technicians who work in practice grey areas and are uncertain whether they should join the new practising register rather than the non-practising register.
That was agreed by the Council at the October
Council meeting during
a presentation by Peter Wilson, the Society’s head of post-registration.
Mr Wilson said that the next step in the Society’s continuing professional
development (CPD) programme was the drafting of guidance on practising
and non-practising status for pharmacists and technicians. The guidance
will go out with the registration paperwork for 2005. Pharmacists who
are still uncertain whether they should register as practising or non-practising
will look to the Society for guidance, although the decision will be
theirs. Examples include retired pharmacists who worked as officers of
the Society’s branches, members working as trust non-executives
in NHS trusts, who are appointed in a personal capacity rather than as
pharmacists, and retired pharmacists who assist their professional colleagues
by working on the Listening Friends Scheme. There was a need to think
about each of these categories and to arrive at logical conclusions to
help pharmacists with their decision.
It is proposed, said Mr Wilson, that for tricky decisions members of
the CPD team and appropriate senior staff should identify the logic of
the case and draft a recommendation. The chairman of the Education Committee
would then act on behalf of the Council to confirm that the recommendation
was appropriate for the person concerned. This would need to happen in
a relatively concentrated way in December 2004 and January 2005, given
the pressure on members and the Society’s desire that they renew
their membership in a timely fashion.
CPD roll-out
Giving an update on the CPD programme, Mr Wilson said that the roll-out
of the CPD framework, which started in the autumn of 2002, would
be completed in Britain will be completed on about 31 October. In 2005
the CPD roll-out would continue to new members, of whom there are
some
1,600 each year. They will need to receive CPD materials and information
about meeting the mandatory framework, as will technicians who join
the Society and overseas members, who have not yet been included
in the roll-out. It was yet to be decided whether the CPD materials should
be sent to all members overseas, sent only on request or distributed
only through the website. The CPD team would put together proposals
for that.
On CPD records, Mr Wilson said that at present they could be made
either on paper or on the secure website at the University of Bath.
Pharmacists
with dial-up connections find the website slow and painful. An offline
recording system now being developed will allow them to make records
on their own computers and upload them to the server at their convenience.
This will be available on request in 2005. Dealing with inadequate records
Mr Wilson said that a procedure is being developed to deal with pharmacists
who make unacceptable records, those who struggle and need support
and those who challenge the system and need to be challenged in their
turn. “We will be developing a procedure — a CPD regulatory
committee is an example of the sort of thing we might be thinking about — to
help us to confirm what the standards of CPD records should be when
they are submitted to the Society for review. Also to help us with
the procedures for handling members whose records are deemed to be
inadequate, ultimately possibly submitting them to some form of disciplinary
machinery. Linked to that, having discussed and agreed what sort of
standards we should be having, they will need to be communicated to
members in a way which is explanatory and helpful.”
On pharmacists wishing to return to practice, Mr Wilson said that during
the consultation with members in March 2003, there were many comments
about the need for a formal process to ensure that pharmacists returning
to practice or moving between sectors of practice are competent to practise.
The CPD Implementation Committee had talked about a framework for achieving
that. Some key decisions had to be made and brought to the Council for
ratification next year. Should completion of a personal development plan
be a requirement for coming back on to the register? How should that
be managed? Should there be required elements, such as an update on changes
in the law and the Code of Ethics. What should constitute a career break
that requires return-to-practice measure? Was 12 months reasonable? Would
two weeks of work in the middle of a 12-month break be sufficient to
avoid the career break regulations?
Mr Wilson added that in the course of 2005 the Society would need to
recruit and train a group of CPD reviewers to look at pharmacists’ CPD
records, generate feedback on whether they met the Society’s criteria
and provide support where improvement was possible. In the case of members
who kept their records on paper, there would be particular difficulties
of receiving records safely, having secure systems to hold them and transferring
them to electronic format for review and archiving. Those systems needed
to be auditable and robust.
Concluding, Mr Wilson said: “Right now, we need to address the
Code of Ethics, which still contains a requirement for pharmacists to
complete 30 hours of continuing education. That needs to be addressed
at the 2005 annual general meeting, so that the Code of Ethics reflects
the requirement on pharmacists to comply with the CPD framework.” Overseas pharmacists
The Treasurer asked whether it was right and proper that in January
overseas members would be asked whether or not they wish to go on the
practising
or non-practising register without having received the CPD package
that will enable them to decide on that key issue.
Mr Wilson said that overseas members could access the CPD materials
on the website.
The Treasurer said that he was concerned that many overseas members
may not bother to renew their subscription at all, let alone opt to
go on
one or the other register. The Secretary and Registrar said that the
Society was establishing a group of overseas members to act as a peer
group for this purpose. She had spoken to a number, all of whom intended
to do CPD and saw it as an important part of their future. |
The
Pharmaceutical Journal