Independent Prescribing for Pharmacists (Taught)

Overview
If you're an experienced practicing pharmacist and want to further your career in a specialist area, joining our PgCert Independent Prescribing for Pharmacists course is the perfect way to fulfil your ambitions.

On this course you'll develop your clinical examination and consultation skills, and build on your understanding of pharmacology and therapeutics, to inform evidence-based management decisions alongside patients within your chosen scope of practice.

When you graduate, you'll be qualified for a career as an independent prescriber within a clinical setting.

What you'll experience
On this course, you'll:

• Learn from experts in the School of Pharmacy and Biomedical Sciences, and the School of Health Sciences and Social Work

• Get hands-on experience in clinical examination and history taking

• Study topics including pharmacology and therapeutics for prescribers, clinical skills for prescribers, and professional aspects of prescribing

• Improve your counselling and consultation skills in our practice dispensary facilities, where you'll consult with patient actors

• Build on your clinical simulation expertise in our clinical skills suite, featuring both CAE and Laerdal human patient simulators

• Be supported by experienced clinical pharmacists as you develop your competencies portfolio

Careers and opportunities
Graduates have gone on to take roles in:

Mental health
Rheumatology
Minor ailments
Pain management
Nutrition
Travel medicine
Critical care
Cardiology
Renal disease
HIV medicine

We'll provide you with as much support as possible in finding employment through close industrial contacts, careers events, recruitment fairs and individual advice.

Changes to course content
We use the best and most current research and professional practice alongside feedback from our students to make sure course content is relevant to your future career or further studies.

Therefore, some course content may change over time to reflect changes in the discipline or industry and some optional units may not run every year. If a unit doesn’t run, we’ll let you know as soon as possible and help you choose an alternative unit.

Work experience and career planning
We'll help you opportunities that will complement your studies.

When you finish the course, our Careers and Employability service can help you find a job that puts your skills to work in the healthcare industry.

After you leave the University, you can get help, advice and support for up to 5 years from our Careers and Employability service as you advance in your career.

Learning support
As well as support by faculty teaching staff and your personal tutor, you can use the University’s Academic Skills Unit (ASK).

ASK provides one-to-one support in areas such as:

academic writing
note taking
time management
critical thinking
presentation skills
referencing
working in groups
revision, memory and exam techniques

Teaching
Teaching on this course includes:

online learning
seminars
workshops
practice

How you'll spend your time
Each academic year is divided into 2 teaching blocks and an assessment period:

Autumn teaching block – September to December
Spring teaching block – January to Easter
Assessment period – Easter to June
Most teaching takes place during the day, on Thursdays, Fridays and very occasionally on Saturdays. You may occasionally need to go to University and course events in the evenings and at weekends.

Teaching dates
Timetabled teaching is due to take place on the following dates. Please note these dates are provisional and may be subject to change.

September 2021 start

• 6, 7, 13 and 20 October 2021

• 3 and 17 November 2021

• 1, 15 and 22 December 2021

• 5 and 19 January 2022

• 2 and 16 February 2022

• 2, 16 and 30 March 2022

How you're assessed
You'll be assessed through:

practical skills assessment
written case studies and therapeutic reviews
portfolio of competencies and reflective accounts

Core modules in this year include:

• Prescribing and Therapeutics for Pharmacists (60 credits)

There are no optional modules in this year.

We use the best and most current research and professional practice alongside feedback from our students to make sure course content is relevant to your future career or further studies.

Therefore, some course content may change over time to reflect changes in the discipline or industry. If a module doesn't run, we'll let you know as soon as possible and help you choose an alternative module.

This course provides an excellent blended learning opportunity with delivery through interactive live and online learning, seminars and workshops. In addition, there is a 90 hour period of learning in practice, which is supervised by a Designated Medical Practitioner.

You will be assessed in ways that align with the practical nature of the course:

Essays
Presentations
Applied Health Assessments (observation in practice)
Observed Structured Clinical Examinations
Portfolio of competencies and reflective accounts

Professionally accredited courses provide industry-wide recognition of the quality of your qualification.

• General Pharmaceutical Council