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Information for employers or system leaders
This page is intended for employers and system leaders who are looking for information to support their Independent Prescribers (IPs) learners and their supervisors (Designated Prescribing Practitioners, DPPs), especially those in primary care.
This page contains some information from the HEE Centre for Advancing Practice, which has been adapted to be relevant for those supervising IP learners specifically.
Why do we need more pharmacists to prescribe?
There is a pressing need to upskill the pharmacy workforce in clinical skills, including prescribing, so that all sectors can work together to provide the services patients need in their preferred setting. A large part of this involves primary care, especially community pharmacies, being ready and able to provide clinical services that may include the need to prescribe (please see the Pharmacy Integration Programme page for more information). Pathfinder projects are currently underway to explore these services and how they might be commissioned across community pharmacies in the future.
Specifically in community pharmacies, prescribing (along with clinical skills and capabilities of pharmacists) is part of a wider shift across the health system to improve access to care in local communities and address health inequalities.
Pharmacist IPs will facilitate quicker and more convenient access to safe and high-quality healthcare, including the prescription of appropriate medicines for minor illness, addressing health issues before they get worse, providing monitoring of long-term health conditions and preventing ill-health.
Wider utilisation of pharmacist prescribers (and education and training available to increase the number of prescribers) provides a fantastic opportunity for systems to realise the benefits of the pharmacist workforce - across all sectors. It's essential that system leaders and pharmacy employers support pharmacists to undergo prescribing qualifications and also support colleagues to act as their DPPs. This will enable systems to develop an integrated pharmacist workforce to meet patients’ needs
Steve Reilly, Pharmacy Integration Lead for the North West
As my confidence has grown as a prescriber, I have been able to benefit many patients through discussion and mutual decision making to initiate, adjust and stop medications.
Patients and other members of the healthcare team have really valued my input and skills. Whilst I still prescribe from my initial specialist scope, I have also expanded my prescribing range to include medicines optimisation which was identified as a service need within my organisation. Becoming a prescriber certainly ignited a new energy in me for my role in patient care and expanded my future career possibilities.Maria Staines, Darrent Valley Hospital, Kent
How do I support my employees to become prescribers?
The most important things you can do are:
- Support them to find appropriate supervision, in the form of a DPP.
- It is a GPhC requirement that a pharmacist undertaking IP training must have a named DPP who takes overall responsibility for supervision and will assess that the IP learner is suitable for IP annotation at the end of their course.
- Support them to fulfil the commitment of the IP course in terms of supervised hours in practice and attendance at lectures.
- Support them to use prescribing in their role, once qualified.
- Support your experienced Independent Prescribers, including Advanced Clinical Practitioners, to become DPPs.
For more information, please visit:
- Independent Prescribing - For funded IP training
- Becoming an Independent Prescriber - For the skills and experience required to be an independent prescriber
Having a prescribing pharmacist has always been a great help and I have always loved having prescribing pharmacists on my ITU ward rounds over the many years. Their advice and comments have helped me to better learn and come to the safest complex prescribing plan for all our complicated patients, and I thank the prescribing pharmacists for this and their friendly counsel.
Dr David Newbould, Critical Care Consultant, Sandwell and West Birmingham's NHS Trust
What is a DPP?
A Designated Prescribing Practitioner (DPP) is a healthcare professional in Great Britain or Northern Ireland with legal independent prescribing rights (an annotation or automatic right to prescribe) who will mentor and supervise the pharmacist during the period of learning in practice. The term DPP encompasses a range of healthcare professionals and includes Designated Medical Practitioners (DMPs).
For more information about what a DPP does, please visit the Becoming a DPP section.
The London and South East Pharmacy team hosted a webinar on Demystifying the role a Pharmacist DPP, which may also be a useful resource. A recording of this webinar is available here.
I have found the presence of a prescribing pharmacist in the team invaluable. I was offered much needed support and guidance when completing my own prescribing hours in the area that I predominantly work in but also, once I qualified, the support continued, and I was offered further support and gained confidence with the prescribing system and other considerations as a result.
Nicki Heys, Advanced Physiotherapist, Sandwell and West Birmingham's NHS Trust
Supervision as part of workforce planning:
Developing supervisor capability and capacity will be a key enabler for the delivery of the NHS Long Term Workforce Plan.
Workforce planning for the pharmacy workforce must consider IP learners’ supervision, and what professional development DPPs may require, from the outset.
Organisations should consider how skill mix and experience across a team or setting can ensure adequate workplace support for DPP development.
Being an IP means that the medications that often get overlooked from a drug history perspective, such as eye drops and creams, which may not seem important but make the patient more comfortable can be prescribed by myself. This lets the doctors concentrate on treating the acute medical issues.
Lowri Tong, Senior clinical pharmacist - cardiovascular
Please take a look at the case studies below to see if you can help introduce any similar work
- Structured medication reviews and the primary care network multidisciplinary approach
- Video case study from Dr Lawrence Brad and Steve Williams of the Westbourne Medical Centre in Bournemouth
- Read about the difference one clinical pharmacist is making at Wallingbrook Health Group
- As general practice evolves, clinical pharmacy expands
- Clinical pharmacists in Wallingbrook Health Group, Devon
- Video case study for patients: Clinical pharmacists in general practice, The Old School Surgery, Bristol
- Video case study for GPs: Wolverhampton Road Surgery
- Clinical pharmacists prescribing better care
- Clinical pharmacist at the front line in providing healthcare to homeless
I really believe in getting more pharmacists prescribing, how can I work with my local colleagues to get started?
Consider whether you could provide a learning environment for an IP learner. Out-of-hours services and urgent treatment centres are ideal learning environments for a pharmacist specialising in prescribing for minor ailments. A general practice is ideal for respiratory, asthma, hypertension or cardiovascular risk. Do you have a cohort of patients with whom a pharmacist could work to gain and demonstrate prescribing competency?
I’m a GP, why would I encourage my pharmacist, practice nurse or Advanced Clinical Practitioner to supervise a learner from outside my practice?
Supervising learners is stimulating and can be incredibly rewarding. It contributes to clinicians’ own development, both personal and professional, and it helps them keep their knowledge and skills up to date and your practice at the forefront of the most recent developments in prescribing and healthcare.
Supervision of IP learners is a particular skill and DPPs will develop links with others for peer support. Where Communities of Practice are in place, they will gain a huge amount from the contacts they make and the support and discussions they have.
It feels good knowing that you are making a real contribution to shaping the future of the workforce and the pleasure you and your employees will get from seeing people succeed, and from their appreciation, is invaluable.
I’m a community pharmacy contractor, what will I gain from supporting my prescribers to act as a DPP?
By increasing DPP capacity in community pharmacy, you will reduce the need for pharmacists to leave the community setting to complete their supervised hours in practice in the future, whether that’s your own pharmacists leaving their pharmacy or pharmacists from other settings coming to you.
You will also be preparing for the reforms to the initial education and training of pharmacists (IETP), which will see all pharmacists completing their IP training in their foundation year. From 2025/26, foundation pharmacists will require a DPP as well as a Designated Supervisor (DS).
What are the benefits for employers?
There are many benefits of supporting and having a DPP, including:
- Supporting workforce retention and recruitment
- Improved patient care and access to medications
- Expanding pharmacy services
- Professional development of individuals as well as supporting the professional development of others
- Encouraging interprofessional working to support patients
- Building local networks with healthcare professionals
Supervision is a key aspect of the maintenance of workforce and public safety, and employers should be able to evidence:
- Investment in supervisor development across all levels of practice
- Continuing professional development of those with supervisory responsibility, for example, through review and inclusion of supervisor learning and development needs in appraisal objectives.
Are there any additional indemnity requirements?
All DPPs should check with their employer and/or indemnity provider whether they are able to act in the capacity of a DPP and that of an IP.
Will NHS England provide funding to the DPP?
No payment will be available for the employer and/or the DPP to undertake the supervision, and no payment will be made to the employer to cover for a pharmacist’s time on the IP course. However, we strongly recommend that you and your employee work together, to ensure that training can be attended safely. Both you and your employee should reflect on the long-term investment and focus on the long-term benefits to completing the training process in full.