The Declaration of Competence (DoC) system has been developed to support you in assuring commissioners that you are service-ready and have the appropriate knowledge, skills and behaviours to deliver high-quality, consistent services. Many commissioners are now including the DoC system in their service specifications, service level agreements and patient group directions. You can download a factsheet and further information for community pharmacy professionals.
As a pharmacy professional you are personally responsible for keeping your knowledge and skills up to date and relevant to your roles and responsibilities. Working through the DoC system supports you with the resources to reflect on your current competences, and identify and meet your learning and assessment needs for each service.
To ensure you work through the DoC system in a systematic manner and meet the relevant competencies, download A guide to using the Declaration of Competence (DoC) system.
Look at this example of a completed DoC for emergency contraception.
Pharmacy is building strong relationships with public health commissioners who see the benefits of commissioning services from the highly accessible healthcare professional on the high street. If you are a commissioner and wish to access the DoC documents please click here.
Demonstrating that you are developing your consultation skills and working towards the practice standards for pharmacy consultations is a core competence within DoC. To ensure you meet this core competence and can provide evidence to your employer and commissioner visit the Consultation skills for pharmacy practice website. The website provides you with useful learning resources in order to reflect on and develop your practice. You can also access the associated assessment here and via the CPPE website.
Meeting the safeguarding competencies expected of all healthcare professionals is also a core competence within DoC. Each DoC self-assessment framework lists available learning and assessment which can provide evidence you meet the safeguarding core competence.
You may have completed safeguarding learning and assessments during the last two years which are not listed on the DoC self-assessment but meet the national core safeguarding competencies. This may include programmes such as the (now withdrawn) CPPE Safeguarding children and adults at risk: a guide for the pharmacy team e-learning and associated level 2 assessment, or level 2 safeguarding learning from another provider.
In this case, you do not need to complete all the safeguarding learning and assessment listed in the DoC unless you have a specific learning need. You can use section 1.4 in the DoC self-assessment form to record safeguarding learning and assessment completed from other training providers.
Step 1 allows you to access the self-assessment framework for completion.
Step 2 provides you with a list of the learning linked to the competencies for this service. It also shows a record of when you have completed this learning, providing guidance on learning you may wish to revisit or access for the first time.
Step 3 provides a list of the assessment(s) associated with the service and a personal record of your assessment completion.
Step 4 will generate your personalised statement of declaration, which may be provided to commissioners and/or employers when required.
Step 5 allows you to notify CPPE when you have signed a statement of declaration. This information may then be provided to commissioners and/or employers via the CPPE Viewer.
