Objective Supplementary prescribing has been a major policy initiative in the UK, which has seen pharmacists and nurses assume greater responsibility for prescribing in collaboration with doctors. This study explored the views and professional context of pharmacists and physicians (who acted as their training mentors), prior to the start of supplementary prescribing training.
Setting Primary and secondary healthcare settings in Northern Ireland.
Method All pharmacists (n = 63) from the first four cohorts enrolled for supplementary prescribing training in Northern Ireland were invited to participate in a series of focus groups, while mentors (n = 54) were asked to participate in face‐to‐face semi‐structured interviews; the research took place between September 2003 and April 2005. All discussions/interviews were audiotaped and transcribed, and analysed using constant comparison.
Key findings Nine pharmacist focus groups were convened (number per group ranging from 4 to 8; total n = 47) and 35 semi‐structured interviews with mentors were conducted. The four main themes that emerged were internal drivers, benefits and concerns, relationships, and beyond the current professional comfort zone. Supplementary prescribing was broadly welcomed by both professional groups and was anticipated to produce improvements in patient care and interprofessional relationships, but there were some concerns about loss of diversity, deskilling of junior doctors, safety and professional encroachment. Caution was expressed with regard to a further extension of prescribing rights, particularly in relation to the role of pharmacists in diagnosis and independent prescribing decision making.
Conclusion Although supplementary prescribing was viewed positively, these findings should be considered in the light of more recent developments in prescribing rights for other health professionals, including pharmacists.
Supplementary prescribing has been successful where it has been implemented but a number of barriers remain which are preventing the wider acceptance of this practice innovation.
This paper describes the design and operation of an 18 992Josephson-junction array which can generate reference voltages up to 12 V. This device has applications for the direct calibration of Zener reference standards, calibrators, and digital voltmeters at the 10-V level, and for very accurate linearity and ratio measurements.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.