Royal Pharmaceutical Society: Revised Competency Framework for all Prescribers (September 2021)

Summary

This competency framework has been developed and updated to support prescribers in expanding their knowledge, skills, motives and personal traits, to continually improve their performance, and work safely and effectively.

Content

'To support all prescribers in prescribing safely and effectively, a single prescribing competency framework was originally published by the National Prescribing Centre/National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) in 2012. 

NICE and Health Education England approached the Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) to manage the update of the framework on behalf of all the prescribing professions in the UK.

A Competency Framework for all Prescribers was first published by the RPS in July 2016. Going forward, the RPS will continue to maintain and publish this framework in collaboration with a multi-disciplinary group with representatives from professional regulators, professional organisations, prescribers from all prescribing professions, lay representatives and other relevant and interested stakeholder groups from across the UK. '

Since the 2016 framework, there have been various changes that needed to be included in the update of the framework, these include:

• Legislation changes introducing paramedic prescribers in April 2018.
• Current prescribing topics, such as remote prescribing, social prescribing, psychosocial assessment and eco-directed sustainable prescribing. 
• Publication of the RPS Competency Framework for Designated Prescribing Practitioners in December 2019; for further information, please see 'A competency framework for designated prescribing practitioners'.

Supporting tools