‘Preparing to Prescribe’ a free online implementation tool kit for non-medical prescribers.

Over 40,000 nurses, pharmacists, physiotherapists, podiatrists, optometrists, and therapeutic radiographers are now able to prescribe medicines, and there are ongoing plans to extend prescribing rights to other healthcare groups e.g. paramedics. Non-medical prescribing (NMP) provides organisations with the ability to improve productivity and quality of patient care. However, there are on- going concerns surrounding levels of support, governance structures and barriers caused by organisational and policy restrictions. In order to accelerate the uptake of non-medical prescribing within services, it is important to improve understanding of the role requirements.

Preparing to prescribe is a Surrey Implementation toolkit™ that provides resources for healthcare professionals, non-medical prescribing leads, service and provider organisations, commissioners, and Universities to support implementation of non-medical prescribing in practice. The ‘Preparing to prescribe’ toolkit consists of trigger questions, signposting and links to current guidance and is designed to support those who wish to become a non-medical prescriber and enhance their knowledge of the role requirements.

The idea to develop the toolkit was inspired by over a decade of work on non-medical prescribing. A team lead by Dr Nicola Carey and Dr Karen Stenner from the School of Health Sciences including NMP leads, educators, researchers and policy makers from the UK, with representation for nursing, pharmacy and allied health professions worked together to inform the content and structure. 

Primarily designed to be used across the UK, the ‘Preparing to Prescribe’ implementation toolkit resources can be used to inform development of non-medical prescribing in other countries. Patients and carers and other medical professionals may also find the tool kit useful.