Clinical Pharmacist
Clinical pharmacists work in primary care as part of a multidisciplinary team in a patient facing role to clinically assess and treat patients using expert knowledge of medicines for specific disease areas. They work with and alongside the general practice team, taking responsibility for patients with chronic diseases and undertaking clinical medication reviews to proactively manage people with complex polypharmacy, especially for the elderly, people in care homes and those with multiple comorbidities.
Dietitian
Dietitians are healthcare professionals that diagnose and treat diet and nutritional problems, both at an individual patient and wider public health level. Working in a variety of settings with patients of all ages, dietitians support changes to food intake to address diabetes, food allergies, coeliac disease and metabolic diseases. Dietitians also translate public health and scientific research on food, health and disease into practical guidance to enable people to make appropriate lifestyle and food choices.
First Contact Physiotherapist
First Contact Physiotherapists (FCPs) are qualified autonomous clinical practitioners who can assess, diagnose, treat, and manage musculoskeletal (MSK) problems and undifferentiated conditions and – where appropriate – discharge a person without a medical referral. FCPs working in this role can be accessed directly by self-referral or by staff in GP practices who can direct patients to them to establish a rapid and accurate diagnosis and management plan to streamline pathways of care.
Occupational therapist
Occupational therapists (OTs) support people of all ages with problems resulting from physical, mental, social, or development difficulties. OTs provide interventions that help people find ways to continue with everyday activities that are important to them. This could involve learning new ways to do things or making changes to their environment to make things easier. As patients’ needs are so varied, OTs help GPs to support patients who are frail, with complex needs, live with chronic physical or mental health conditions, manage anxiety or depression, require advice to return or remain in work and need rehabilitation so they can continue with previous occupations (activities of daily living).
Care Coordinator
Care Coordinators play an important role within the PCN (Primary Care Network) to proactively identify and work with people, including the frail/elderly and those with long-term conditions, to provide coordination and navigation of care and support across health and care services.
Care Coordinators provide extra time, capacity, and expertise to support patients in preparing for or in following-up clinical conversations they have with primary care professionals. They will work closely with the GPs and other primary care professionals within the PCN to identify and manage a caseload of identified patients, making sure that appropriate support is made available to them and their carers, and ensuring that their changing needs are addressed. This is achieved by bringing together all the information about a person’s identified care and support needs and exploring options to meet these within a single personalised care and support plan, based on what matters to the person.
Social Prescribing Link Worker
Social prescribing enables all primary care staff and local agencies to refer people to a link worker. Link workers give people time and focus on what matters to the person as identified through shared decision making or personalised care and support planning. They connect people to community groups and agencies for practical and emotional support. They work within multidisciplinary teams and collaborate with local partners to support community groups to be accessible and sustainable and help people to start new groups. Social prescribing complements other approaches such as ‘active signposting’. Link workers typically support people on average over 6-12 contacts (including phone calls, meetings and home visits)
Community Paramedic
First contact Paramedics deliver a high standard of patient care within the practice, working at the top of their clinical scope of practice. As a member of a varied clinical team, they manage a clinical caseload, dealing with presenting patients’ needs within a primary care setting, ensuring patient choice and ease of access to services. They support the Same Day Care team within the practice e.g. minor injury and illness, abdominal pains, chest pain, tiredness, and headache. They also mentor and support staff in developing and maintaining clinical skills.