Overview

The Advanced Professional Practice programme has been developed in response to the emerging requirements for Advanced and Specialist Practice within the Pharmacy profession. The programme is designed to allow pharmacists choice and flexibility in their progression to Diploma and Masters awards to meet their specific professional development needs in relation to the competencies required for advanced practice.

The 'Competency Frameworks for the Advanced Practitioner' forms a core part of the APP (Pharmacy) programme and the DPharm, and provides an introduction to advanced practice and the relevant competency frameworks.

Studying this module will provide students with an understanding of how practitioners develop, what advanced practice is, and the different developmental frameworks available to support practitioners to develop their advanced practice.

Module aims

This module will enable you to develop a comprehensive understanding of competency frameworks and their use in developing advanced and specialist professional practice.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this module you should be able to:

• Critically discuss the concept of advanced and specialist practice in relation to your professional discipline and to your own individual practice.
• Identify, with justification, the competency framework most relevant to your own practice.
• Apply the relevant competency framework to your own professional practice and identify your learning needs.

Entry requirements

This module will be open to pharmacists, who are practising and registered with the GPhC:

1. who wish to achieve the Diploma in Advanced Professional Practice (Pharmacy), an Advanced Professional Practice (Open Learn) award or the Doctorate in Pharmacy.
2. as a stand-alone module for pharmacists wanting an introduction to the competency frameworks for advanced practice.

This module is also suitable for registered general medical practitioners and dental practitioners:

1. who wish to achieve the Diploma in Advanced Professional Practice (Open Learn) award.
2. as a stand-alone module for an introduction to the use of competency frameworks in relation to Practitioner with Special Interest (PwSI; GPwSI) accreditation.

English language proficiency requirement

If English is not your first language, you must either:

Hold a degree from a school where English was the language of instruction
OR
Take the IELTS (average of 7.0 with a minimum of 6.5 in all categories).

Please note that IETLS exams must be no more than two years old at the start of the course for which you have applied.

Module content

The majority of the learning material will be provided in the module reader on the Keele Learning Environment, so that you can study where and when it is convenient for you. There will be one study day at Keele.

You are also expected to do your own reading as guided by and beyond the reading list that will be provided in the module. The module reader will cover concepts such as:

• Definitions of advanced practice.
• An introduction to competency frameworks in general and how to apply them to individual practice.
• Identification of competency frameworks relevant for advanced practice.
• How to identify learning needs using a competency framework.
• How to build a portfolio of evidence to demonstrate achievement of competencies including the types of evidence that could be included.

Teaching and assessment

There are two elements of assessment for this module:

1. A 3000 word essay defining advanced and specialist practice, describing recent developments within the profession and what it means for you in your practice, including a discussion around the available competency frameworks and justification for the framework most relevant to your practice.
2. An evaluation of your current practice against the relevant competency framework