Services Database Community Pharmacy ENT Assessment Service (Leeds Area)

The NHS Leeds CCG Community Pharmacy ENT Assessment Service aims to provide eligible patients with access to self-care advice for the treatment of minor ear, nose and throat (ENT) conditions. Patients will be examined by a suitably trained community pharmacist, (additional training is required to provide this service - refer to pharmacist training requirements), who will undertake a clinical history and perform a physical examination on the patient using appropriate equipment provided for the service, e.g. use of an otoscope to see inside the ear.
Patients can be referred into the ENT Assessment Service through the Community Pharmacist Consultation Service (CPCS) or can attend a participating pharmacy to request the service.
Patients will be provided with self-care advice to manage the condition, (including what to do if symptoms persist or get worse), and/or recommended to purchase an OTC treatment.
Where the condition is assessed as requiring antibiotics, the pharmacist will escalate the patient accordingly.
Patients will receive a follow-up call from the pharmacist 3-5 days after the initial consultation to check how the patient is getting on and answer any questions the patient may have.
The service is initially only open to pharmacies located in specific areas of Leeds (as determined by NHS Leeds CCG). Therefore, for this first phase of the service, only those pharmacies invited to apply are eligible to provide the service.
 

• Pharmacists can only provide this service once they have completed all the mandatory training requirements.
• The service can only be provided by a pharmacist who has undertaken the CPPE ENT Advanced Clinical Assessment Skills workshop. This is a half day, (3.5 hours), face-to-face workshop that includes a medic, clinical demonstrator, and simulated patients. This is a bespoke workshop and will only be available on fixed dates (there is no equivalent training available via the CPPE website).
• In addition to the CPPE training (see above), the pharmacist must attend, (or watch), the local online training event for this service which will provide a practical overview of the service e.g. how the service works, managing patient expectation, referrals back, Antimicrobial Stewardship. This event will be recorded and available online via the Community Pharmacy West Yorkshire website - http://www.cpwy.org/
• Pharmacists who deliver this service must demonstrate they are competent to provide a minor ailment service by completion of the CPPE Declaration of Competence (DoC) for Minor Ailments. This should include evidence that the pharmacist has undertaken the CPPE e-learning on Sepsis https://www.cppe.ac.uk/gateway/sepsis.
• The pharmacist must have satisfactorily completed the Health Education England Antimicrobial Stewardship for Community Pharmacy e-learning and e-assessment at https://www.e-lfh.org.uk/programmes/antimicrobial-resistance-and-infections/
• Pharmacists are expected to reflect on their knowledge, skills and competences before making the declarations, and to address any learning and development before starting to deliver the service. It is expected that pharmacists providing the service are familiar with and have worked through the NICE Clinical Knowledge Summaries (CKS) on ENT conditions.
• Pharmacists providing the service must read and ensure that they fully understand the service specification for the service.
• The responsible pharmacist on each given day has overall responsibility for ensuring the service is delivered in accordance with this service specification.