Home Pharmacists with a Special Interest
The Department of Health and NHS Primary Care Contracting launched a national framework for Pharmacists with a Special Interest (PhwSI) on Monday 4th September 2006. 
This guidance framework is part of the ongoing implementation of 'A Vision for Pharmacy in the new NHS', and sits alongside the wider development of the pharmacy workforce including national occupational standards for pharmacy roles, better use of skill mix, and the establishment of consultant pharmacist posts.
It includes a definition, guidance on how PhwSI services can be put in place, a competency framework for PhwSIs and examples of current service models similar to PhwSI. The framework will allow accredited PhwSIs to work alongside other primary care professionals to deliver care in new ways using redesigned care pathways, to support the policy direction described in the White Paper Our health, our care, our say.
Working principally in the community, experienced pharmacists will now be given the option to become 'experts' in long-term conditions like Parkinson's Disease, skin disorders or by managing medicines like anticoagulation drugs.
Pharmacists will have to undergo extra competency based training beyond their core professional role, and become accredited, in order to demonstrate appropriate knowledge and skills before becoming a PhwSI.
Once qualified, PhwSIs will be able to deliver more services to patients such as holding specialist diabetes clinics with patients to help them manage their medicines and illness, working closely with other health professionals involved in their care.
Unveiling the National framework for Pharmacists with Special Interests at the British Pharmaceutical Conference in Manchester, Health Minister Andy Burnham said:
"New and extended roles for experienced staff are a key part our NHS reforms. "All pharmacists play a valuable role in helping patients manage their medicines, as well as contributing to public health.
Pharmacists with Special Interests will give patients more choice about where, when and from who they seek healthcare advice and treatment for things such as sexually transmitted infections, substance misuse and diabetes, or heart attack and stroke prevention through monitoring anticoagulation medicines."
"Although we want patients to have easy access to care and medicines when needed, patient safety must always be top priority.
"This framework builds on community pharmacy's traditional strengths of quality, safety and accessibility by setting out a process of accreditation and competency for pharmacists to help ensure that patients receive the highest quality of care."
National Clinical Director for Primary Care, David Colin Thome said:
"The creation of Pharmacists with Special Interests means that pharmacists can join GPs and other practitioners with special interests in more fully utilising their clinical skills for the benefits for patients.
"The development of services that Pharmacists with Special Interests will be providing is a key part of reform in the NHS - reform that will offer a choice from an extended range of services more conveniently available to patients and the wider public.
Chief Pharmaceutical Officer at the Department of Health, Dr Keith Ridge, said:
"This is a time of great change in the health service. The patient care and NHS services provided by pharmacists continue to evolve.
Alongside the new contractual framework for community pharmacy and the development of prescribing by pharmacists, this is another significant step forward for the pharmacy profession in delivering frontline clinical services to patients in the community.
"This will help ensure patients and the NHS gain the maximum from pharmacists' clinical training and knowledge, and in particular their expert knowledge of medicines."
To download a copy of the framework and guidance click on the link below:
Implementing care closer to home - providing convenient quality care for patients. A national framework for Pharmacists with Special Interests
The NHS Primary Care Commissioning website hosts a set of Practitioners with Special Interests (PwSI) specialty frameworks which aim to facilitate the delivery and accreditation of services in primary and community settings. They were commissioned by the DH and have been developed by the Royal College of General Practitioners with support from the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain and NHS Primary Care Commissioning. They replace existing frameworks developed from 2003.
PCTs should ensure that all existing PwSI have been re-accredited by 31 March 2009 and that any new PwSI is accredited in line with the guidance issued in April 2007 (Implementing Care Closer To Home: Convenient Quality Care For Patients).
The documents can be accessed on the Primary Care Commissioning PwSI web page.