Managing medicines

Last updated: Wednesday, July 03, 2024

This tutorial is aimed at trainee hospital pharmacists and new foundation pharmacists: the learning outcomes for this topic are here.

☞ Why this subject matters...

The NHS can be a confusing place, and the overall structure of the health service is complicated. In England, there have been significant changes in recent years to bring health and care organisations closer together to work in a more joined-up way by forming ‘integrated care systems’ (ICSs). This video from the King’s Fund helps to explain this in more detail including how ICSs are composed of integrated care boards (ICBs) and integrated care partnerships. NHS England Workforce, Training and Education (formerly HEE) have developed an e-learning programme to introduce ICSs to pharmacy professionals. 

But pharmacy has its own complexities too. When you first start working in a hospital pharmacy, you may be puzzled by some of the abbreviations you hear. A colleague might ask you about a patient’s PODs, discuss the latest NICE ‘TA’, or tell you about the PGD that was approved at the APC… And it’s not just abbreviations either. What’s ‘homecare’? What’s a ‘special’? This is the world of hospital pharmacy jargon, and you will soon be an expert, but it’s not always easy at the beginning of your career to work out what it all means. In this tutorial we hope to give you a brief introduction to these and other topics.

It is only a basic overview, so some of this material will be known to you already. It's designed to make sure that you are familiar with some essentials, and you might find this tutorial helpful to refer back to.

Click here to start or you can look at an individual section via the links below:










When you've finished this tutorial, why not record a CPD entry via myGPhC?
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