NHS priorities

Whether it’s to prepare for the next Pharmacy Quality Scheme deadline, or to increase your confidence in helping people with a learning disability, this section provides topic-specific pages that link to current NHS priorities. This section will support you in keeping your knowledge and skills up to date in order to provide high-quality pharmacy services and be service-ready.

Clinical pharmacy

Our clinical portfolio is expanding on a frequent basis, helping you to advance your knowledge and skills and deliver medicines optimisation in practice for all sectors of pharmacy. From two new focal points a year to our small group learning for hospital pharmacists – Optimise – this section focuses on clinical pharmacy, diseases and therapeutics.

Public health

The public health agenda is embedded in pharmacy, yet topics such as emergency contraception or stop smoking support are as prevalent as ever. As well as our public health workshops, use this section to access a wide range of resources to assure and maintain your competence, all underpinned by the Declaration of Competence system.

NHS Pharmacy Contraception Service (PCS) Tier 1 Advanced Service – ongoing supply of contraception

PCS - advanced Tier 2 - pilot

Community pharmacy is well established in the provision of locally commissioned contraception and sexual health services.

Chapter 2 of the NHS Long Term Plan (LTP) highlights the importance of NHS services complementing the action taken by local government to support the commissioning of sexual health services. The LTP also facilitates exploration of the future commissioning arrangements to widen access and create capacity where needed in sexual health services. Public Health England’s 2019 Resource for commissioners and providers highlighted the role community pharmacy can play in supporting ongoing contraception. In response to this, and in line with the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework (CPCF): 2019 to 2024 commitment to ‘test a range of prevention services’, a tiered pharmacy contraception service has been designed.

The tiered approach will be as follows:

  • Tier 1 - Ongoing monitoring and supply of repeat oral contraception (OC) prescriptions
  • Tier 2 - Initiation of OC via a Patient Group Direction (PGD)
  • Tier 3 - Ongoing monitoring and management of repeat long-acting reversible contraception (LARC), excluding intrauterine systems (IUS) and intrauterine devices (IUD)
  • Tier 4 - Initiation of LARCs

The aim of the Pharmacy Contraception Service (PCS) is to offer greater choice for people in terms of where they can access contraception services and create additional capacity in primary care and sexual health clinics (or equivalent) to support meeting the demand for more complex assessments.

This service will support the important role community pharmacy teams can play in helping address health inequalities. The service will help to provide wider healthcare access in local communities and signpost service users to local sexual health services in line with NICE guideline NG102.

Aims and objectives of the Tier 1 Advanced Service:

Tier 1 of the PCS allows pharmacy contractors to establish the first step of a fully integrated care model. This will provide people with greater choice and access to ongoing OC supplies, previously initiated in primary care or a sexual health clinic (or equivalent).

Objectives:

  • To provide a model for community pharmacy teams to continue the provision of OC supplies initiated in primary care or sexual health clinics (or equivalent). This will be undertaken using PGDs to support the review and supply process.
  • To establish an integrated pathway between existing services and community pharmacies that provides people with greater choice and access when considering continuing their current form of OC.
  • On this page, you will find a collection of resources to support you in your preparation for delivering this service. We recommend that you start by familiarising yourself with the service specification, which can be found under the first tab below, before working through the competency requirements and accessible training modules. If you feel that you would benefit from further reading, we recommend that you access the further learning resources.

    NHS Pharmacy Contraception Management Service - service specifications

    The first step in becoming ready to deliver this service is accessing and working through the Service Specification

    Oral Contraception Management service specification

    There is also a Toolkit (coming soon) associated with this service which will help with implementation, click on the link below to access this when available.

    Competency requirements

    Before commencement of the service, the pharmacy contractor must ensure that pharmacists and pharmacy staff providing the service are competent to do so in line with the specific skills and knowledge in paragraph 5.4 of the service specification and the relevant PGDs. This may involve completion of training.

    Competency evidence

    The pharmacy contractor will keep documentary evidence that all pharmacists and pharmacy staff involved in the provision of the service are competent with regards to the specific skills and knowledge below.

    Pharmacists providing the service will be personally responsible for remaining up to date with the skills and competencies identified in paragraph 5.4 of the service specification.

    Accessible training modules

    To deliver this service, the pharmacist should have evidence of competence in the clinical skills and knowledge covered in the following training modules, as highlighted below.

    Consultation skills for pharmacy practice assessment

    The CPPE Consultation skills for pharmacy practice e-assessment is linked with the practice standards for consultations skills and the CPPE consultation skills learning programmes. Completing this assessment will help you to check your progress and your ability to meet the competencies set out in the practice standards for consultation skills, enabling you to deliver person-centred care. Passing the assessment will provide assurance to you, your colleagues and other healthcare professionals and patients that you are able to recognise good practice, as well as practice that needs development.

    The assessment has a 45-minute time limit. Depending on your previous experience and learning, you may need to look at the range of CPPE consultations skills resources accessible via the Consultation skills (foundation) learning gateway to supplement your learning in this area.

    CPPE Emergency Contraception e-learning and assessment

    The CPPE Emergency contraception e-learning and associated assessment will help you to identify who may need advice and support, show how you can give that support and help you find the best course of action. It includes information on emergency hormonal contraception, and the intrauterine device.

    This learning takes an estimated 3 hours to complete.

    Contraception

    In relation to contraception, there are two options to show competence in this area. You can either complete the CPPE Contraception e-learning and assessment or the specified Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Health modules.

    CPPE Contraception e-learning and assessment

    The CPPE Contraception e-learning and associated assessment will equip you with the up-to-date skills and knowledge that you need to confidently support and advise patients who use or might use contraception.

    This learning takes an estimated 6 hours to complete.

    FSRH Sexual and Reproductive Health (e-SRH) - section 3: Contraceptive choices and associated unit assessments

    Complete the following four sub-sections of FSRH Sexual and Reproductive Health (e-SRH) Contraceptive choices, and associated unit assessments:

  • Mechanism of action, effectiveness and UKMEC: This unit will give an overview of the contraceptive choices that are currently available and explore their effectiveness. It will outline the principles of assessment so that safe contraceptive choices can be offered using evidence-based guidance. The session will also discuss the mechanisms for initiating and switching methods.
  • Choosing contraceptive methods: This unit will discuss the principles, practical application and various ways of exploring an individual’s preference when wanting to start or change their method of contraception.
  • Combined hormonal contraception: This unit looks at the use of combined hormonal contraception (CHC) methods containing oestrogen and progestogen. It gives an overview of the advantages, disadvantages and possible side-effects, as well as how to counsel individuals wishing to commence or continue using CHC.
  • Progestogen only methods (oral and injectable): This unit details the oral and injectable progestogen-only (PO) contraceptive methods, their advantages and disadvantages, including side-effects and contraindications. Safe prescribing and administration will also be discussed.

    You can access these modules via the e-LFH link on the CPPE website.

    Depending on prior experience, it is estimated that this will take you approximately 3 hours to complete.

  • Sexual health

    In relation to sexual health, there are two options to show competence in this area. You can either complete the CPPE Sexual health in pharmacies e-learning and assessment or the specified Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Health modules.

    CPPE Sexual health in pharmacies e-learning and assessment

    The CPPE Sexual health in pharmacies e-learning and associated assessment aims to support the community pharmacy team in developing and providing a sexual health service. This programme focuses on sexually transmitted infections (STIs).

    This learning takes an estimated 6 hours to complete.


    FSRH Sexual and Reproductive Health (e-SRH) - section 9: STIs

    Complete the following four sub-sections and linked assessments of FSRH Sexual and Reproductive Health (e-SRH) STI unit:

  • Epidemiology and transmission of STIs: This session describes the epidemiology, risk factors, signs, symptoms and complications of common sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in the UK.
  • STI testing: This session will cover testing for common sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and blood-borne viruses (BBVs). It will explore current testing options for these in the community and home testing and when to refer to specialist services. This session looks at the diagnostic methods used for vaginal discharge. It describes asymptomatic screening for STIs in men and women.
  • STI management: This session gives an overview of the current management of commonly encountered sexually transmitted infections (STIs).
  • Partner notification: The session will explore the principles, practical application and various ways of carrying out partner notification (PN) when dealing with sexually transmitted infections (STIs).

    You can access these modules via the e-LFH link on the CPPE website.

    Depending on prior experience, it is estimated that this will take you approximately 3 hours to complete.

  • FSRH contraceptive counselling online course

    This Contraceptive Counselling online course is available from the FSRH website and is aimed to support you to deliver effective contraceptive care. It features a range of case studies, video content and additional reading resources to support your learning.

    This course will take you 2 hours to complete.

    Further learning resources

    If you have identified further learning needs or would like to learn more about this topic to support your service delivery, then you may benefit from accessing the following learning resources.

    CPPE Patient group directions e-learning for healthcare module

    The Patient group directions e-learning programme provided by Health Education England’s elearning for healthcare hub is provided by clicking on the link above.

    Measuring blood pressure

    Most pharmacies will have their own standard operating procedure for the measurement of blood pressure. There are several resources that you can use to develop your competence to measure blood pressure.

    CPPE blood pressure monitoring video

    This is a CPPE video to support you to measure blood pressure using an automated device.

    British and Irish Hypertension Society resources
    The British and Irish Hypertension Society (BIHS) offers a variety of different poster and video resources, including: How to measure blood pressure and Ambulatory blood pressure monitoring

    Please note that the BIHS are unable to answer contractor questions about stock availability and other questions relating to equipment, such as price.

    Any queries about this service should be directed to england.pharmacyintegration@nhs.net