Farahnaaz: I've been a pharmacist for 12 years and a clinical pharmacist in general practice for eight years. When I started, I was working in the community and I just felt like I wasn't using all of the clinical knowledge that I had. Then I saw this NHS programme for pharmacists in GP practices. It was a pilot scheme. Hardly anyone I knew was in a GP practice then, so I just joined and it was the best thing I did. I learned so much from the GPs, nurses and reception about patient care. It was really amazing.
Farahnaaz: I worked in a few different GP practices and then PCNs were created. I was in Brighton and I was looking for jobs and I saw Suvera. I was like, wow, that's so interesting. It was a natural development for me with digital healthcare too. I thought, I've got so much knowledge and experience with different conditions and patients that I could bring to the table. Vice versa, with Suvera, I looked at the history and I saw something new for me as well that I could learn from in terms of health tech. It really attracted me and the benefits and company culture just caught my attention. It was very different from anything else I had seen.
Farahnaaz: Yeah, I think knowing how practices and different people work really helps. When you're working remotely, you may necessarily know that when you first start. It's nice to have that experience and bring it to the company. And it was easy to jump in because we're working with lots of different GP practices as well. I felt quite comfortable supporting the various PCNs and practices we work with.
Farahnaaz: Eight years ago, it was very new. I was the first clinical pharmacist in my practices at the time. They were like, ‘Oh my god you can do all these things.’ At that point they actually didn't know what to do with me. But the more that I worked, the more things they started to give me. Even the GPs were like, ‘Okay, you have this background, we can use those skills and enhance them.’ It was a big help with their workload too.
Farahnaaz: So, I usually split my day up. I've got morning clinic and afternoon clinic and then
just before lunch I've got an admin slot to catch up on things and check if I have any tasks to do. After lunch, I have some more appointments, and then there’s a larger chunk of admin time to review tasks or any patient messages that need responding to. Throughout the day we've also got meetings like our weekly care team meeting and company meeting. Then we've got our smaller PCN meetings where we can discuss anything that we need to about the PCN we’re working with.
“Our clinics vary. We cover hypertension, diabetes and cholesterol so there’s lots of different appointments. It’s great.”
Farahnaaz: I like contacting patients remotely. Often, if you are in practice and the patient doesn’t turn up then that appointment is kind of a write off. I find patients are more likely to pick up this way as they've got very busy lives with work and things like that. They're able to take that five to ten minutes out to do the consultation. Whereas in practice, if it's a DNA, it’s likely they're not going to show up again and it’s going to be a waste of the appointment.
Also, even if you can't do a full review, you can give them some information and make a follow up and things like that. I find it is easier for patients now, especially those who have a busier lifestyle who can't take time off. They’re able to submit their information online and then everything's ready and you can go straight into the consultation. When we send out our questionnaires, they can fill everything out and blood pressure information is recorded. It’s all ready when you go to review the patient. I find that really, really useful.
Farahnaaz: The dynamic is really good. We've all come from different areas and different practices. We're really interested in getting to know each other too. It’s a very non-judgmental team and everyone is always willing to help and very responsive. We've all got different roles, but I feel like we all treat each other the same. There's no sort of hierarchy or anything like that. We're just, you know, listening to each other's thoughts and giving feedback. I think it's nice to have that open communication without any sort of judgment. We're all very supportive and it's obvious that the company is always looking to improve its service and culture. We're encouraged to give feedback and have our thoughts heard so it’s really nice.
“It's like a big group of friends, basically. That's exactly how I would describe it.”
Farahnaaz: Well, I've been here for about a year and a half, and I just see the development of everything, our service and the number of practices that we're managing. Also, the tech that we're developing like our dashboard and things like that have changed so much. I can imagine that it's only going to get even better. It’s that development over time and you can see it growing and expanding and we're getting bigger. Because more and more patients want to deal with their health remotely, it's nice to see that we have our own unique health tech compared to other companies.
Farahnaaz: I've noticed that a lot of patients are very proactive with their health, more than they were before. They're always looking for ways to improve it, and as we manage a lot of diabetes and hypertension, there's a lot of lifestyle information out there that can help with management of those conditions. So I do listen to a few podcasts about holistic approaches to health, how to improve your general wellbeing, sleep, diet, exercise and lifestyle with stress and things like that. There's a few snippets where you think, oh, actually that small piece of advice would really help a patient I know. Just recommending regular sleep patterns and things like that. Small, little bits of advice really do help.
“A lot of patients are saying they don't just want to rely on medications. They're happy to take them, but they want to implement other changes to create a healthier lifestyle too. I'm really interested in that.”
I listen to a podcast by Doctor Chatterjee. It's called ‘Live Better, Feel More’. He's a GP and he brings in professionals from other areas like neurologists if it's about preventing dementia or Alzheimer's for example. They have a discussion and then at the end there's little snippets of advice that you can give to someone who can practically implement it in their day-to-day life. I think that's really important because each patient is different. Each patient has a different lifestyle. We have to take that into consideration. I can't give them advice that would suit me and not them. It’s about going through their lifestyle with them, and picking out things that might suit them better, their health and their habits.
Farahnaaz: Definitely. When I started at Suvera, I’d moved house and it was so nice to have that time to settle in. I realised I also spent a lot of time getting ready for work and traveling and all that. Now, I do more hobbies and things around the house. I can spend more time going out or to the gym, instead of being out the whole day at work. It saves a lot of money as well.
“It's nice to have that working from home environment and that extra time to do things for you.”
Farahnaaz: I just think it's great that it’s evolved so much. We've been given more opportunity to develop our skills, especially clinically, and you can see the benefit in GP practices. I've spoken to colleagues and GPs and I don't think they could do without their GP pharmacist working with them to help with certain targets and relieving pressure on the practice. You can see it's made a big difference. Even in community pharmacies, there's lots of services they can offer now which is amazing, and we can refer our patients there instead of booking a GP appointment. It’s really interesting to see how the role has developed over time. Also now within the MPharm course, they’re introducing prescribing as a mandatory part of it. Whereas before you have to do it after two years of being a pharmacist. It just shows that we are really useful. We can prescribe and it's so beneficial.
Farahnaaz: Within Suvera, we've created a wellbeing community. I've been trained as a mental health first aider and that's been such a great opportunity for me. I don't think I've seen this kind of wellbeing culture anywhere else. It's really important, because we spend most of our time at work. It's important that we're interested in people's wellbeing and the company has trained a few of us to be first aiders to support with mental health concerns. I’m really looking forward to seeing where it goes.
Farahnaaz: It depends. There's few different areas. If you notice a change in someone’s behaviour, you can reach out to them, check in to see how they're getting on and just have a chat. If anyone needs help, they can approach us too. We can have a Zoom call or a coffee, things like that, and discuss if there’s anything that's going on. Then, it’s just assessing the situation from there, and signposting to sources of support. It might be that the person needs to get something off their mind and after that they’re fine and feel better. But if there is something that we feel they need further support with, we can refer them onto other services with a GP.
“It's nice at Suvera that we're allowed to explore these kinds of things. We're encouraged to pursue what we enjoy. We've got a company that allows us to do that.”
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