Position Summary:

• The job-holder is providing clinical pharmacy services for the majority of their normal working hours. 

• Their experience, skills and knowledge will make them a source of expertise in pharmacotherapy.

• The job-holder will consistently work to an advanced level, exceeding the performance expected of a clinical pharmacist in all their work.

Principal Accountabilities:

• Medicine Distribution.

• Patient care.

• Medicines Information.

• Continuing Personal Development.

• Teamwork and Professional Collaboration.

• Management and leadership.

MAIN RESPONSIBILITIES:

Medicine Distribution:

• Medicine distribution is not usually a large part of their working hours but they are accountable to Understand and adhere to Qatar Medicine laws and regulations.

• Take legal responsibility for the professional standard of their own work ensuring that medicines they dispense or prepare / check for in-patients and out-patients are provided in a safe and efficient manner.

• Always demonstrates personal accuracy when dispensing/ preparing and when checking the work of others.

Patient care:

• Ensuring the safety and effectiveness of medication is a vital part of patient care.

• The post holders responsibilities require them to; Verify physician orders against the known medication profile of a patient.

• Identify and resolve problems with medication orders.

• Clarify the medication profile though the use of the medical record (paper and electronic) and discussions with the doctor and patient or their carer.

• Monitor medication effectiveness by review of the medical record and direct questioning of the patient or their carer.

• Monitors and reports medication errors, adverse events and complaints that are identified by or involve the clinical Pharmacists and works with colleagues to resolve the issue and minimize future risk .

• The clinical pharmacy specialist is also responsible for ensuring that the medication plan of patients in their care is reviewed to identify all actual and potential problems and if they require additional or alternative therapeutic interventions, the clinical pharmacist will recommend these to the physician. [They may be privileged to order certain medication related laboratory tests] e.g. Ensuring appropriate laboratory tests are ordered and interpreted correctly.  

• Modifying regimen to improve medication adherence.

• Modifying regimen to comply with formulary policy.

• Modifying regimen to improve the safety or cost effectiveness of treatment.

• The clinical pharmacy specialist must document their patient care contribution.

• Understand the hospital policy and procedure that control the medical record.

• Be competent in accessing all areas of the medical record.

• Write in the medical record and progress notes to communicate with clinicians.

• Ensure that such records are up to date, confidential and secure.

• Limited prescribing privileges, although not yet established, are anticipated.

• A senior clinical pharmacist [with appropriate training and privileging] could be expected to take responsibility for writing some in-patient and discharge medication orders.

Medicines information:

As an independent pharmacy practitioner they will be expected to;

• Counsel patients and their carers on the effective use of their medicines.

• Accurately identify information needs and meets those needs accurately and in a timely manner.

• Effective use of readily available reference sources (paper and electronic) to support their recommendations to physicians.

• Furthermore, clinical pharmacy specialists may provide the formal medicines / drug information service within a hospital in which they would be expected to;

• Be competent in the retrieval and interpretation of primary source data (published clinical trials and reviews).

• Provide clinicians with a clear interpretation of inconclusive or conflicting medical information.

• Understand how evidence based interventions and guidelines are developed.

Continuing professional development:

• A Senior Clinical Pharmacist is expected to maintain the Continuing Professional Development (CPD) requirements (e.g. Credit Hours) for maintaining a Pharmacist license in the state of Qatar or the hospital requirements if these are higher.

• In addition to the basic CPD, a pharmacist who has chosen to specialize in clinical pharmacy will be expected to pursue additional post graduate formal studies (including part-time) to underpin their specialization.

• The Senior Clinical Pharmacist would be expected to contribute to the teaching of in-house clinical pharmacy programs including the in-service training of pharmacy residents, interns and work-place students.

Teamwork and Professional Collaboration:

• Participate in the pharmacy shift and on-call system for their facility (as required).

• The senior clinical pharmacist is expected to demonstrate strong interdisciplinary teamwork and work effectively with people of different professions and at different levels.

• As required, they are expected to demonstrate team leadership skills at pharmacy and interdisciplinary level.

• Collaboration with local pharmacy education programs is an important activity.

• When the opportunity is available, a senior clinical pharmacist would be eligible to be considered for; Adjunct professor positions.

• Cross-appointments between hospital and Qatar based Universities.

Management and leadership:

• Deputize for their line manager (e.g. Assistant Director) in the meetings of the pharmacy senior management team or P&T Committee.

• Guide and supervise the Residents, Pharmacy Technicians, Interns and students who work within the clinical pharmacy service.

• Act as a mentor / coach for clinical residents and contribute to their appraisal.

• Ensure the consistency of service to patients and other stakeholders by collecting and processing data to evaluate the clinical pharmacy service.

Problem Solving / Decision Making:

• Problem solving is a key part of this job and will be required to work with clinician, often in acute, changing situations, and use that to produce a pharmaceutical care plan for each patient.