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The Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) has called its member to to express their views and fill out the Department of Health and Social Care's hub and spoke survey on the proposed model of dispensing. The Society has urged its members to fill out the survey before May 20. RPS president Claire Anderson said: "It is vital that RPS members have their say on issue that impact you in your roles. Currently only single legal entities can make use of this model of dispensing. "Our survey, which opened today, seeks your views and comments and will help to inform the RPS submission to this consultation." The consultation on the proposals to enable all community pharmacies to access hub and spoke dispensing published by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) will run for three months and will close on June 8, 2022.

To support the mental health and wellbeing of pharmacists, the Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) is running its fourth annual Workforce Wellbeing survey, in partnership with Pharmacist Support. This year it's focussed on exploring some of the obstacles that prevent workforce wellbeing measures being implemented in practice. It's vital that workplace supports good mental health and wellbeing and provides the right environment to help prevent the negative effects of working under intense pressure. RPS urges: "Please complete the survey as soon as you can. It's anonymous, open to pharmacists in all settings including students and you don't need to be a member of RPS to take part." "We'll take the results of the survey to governments across Great Britain, the NHS, and wider stakeholders to advocate for improvements to support the mental health and wellbeing of pharmacists."

The Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS)'s new research (YouGov poll) revealed that one in five of UK adults (19%) keep their medicines in the bathroom. The research revealed, "Almost one in two (45%) of UK adult keep their medicines in the kitchen, which could also cause problems. RPS Chief Scientist Professor Parastou Donyai said: "It's important to store your medicines in the right place as this could affect how they work. "Medicines should be stored in a cool, dry place and are particularly affected by heat and moisture. Keeping your medicines in the same place as where you have baths and showers could make your medicines less effective or spoil them. "Instead keep your medicines in another room, for example your bedroom or if you keep them in the kitchen, make sure this is in a kitchen cabinet, away from sources of heat such as the hob, oven or windowsill. If you have small children or pets in the home, always make sure your medicines are kept in a lockable storage box somewhere out of their reach and sight."

The Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) Director for Scotland Clare Morrison participated in the panel discussion alongside representatives from other health professional organisations on tackling the workforce crisis at the SNP conference in Aberdeen on 8 October. At the conference, the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care committed to achieving protected learning time for health professionals. Morrison welcomed the Cabinet Secretary's statement as fantastic news for pharmacists across Scotland. "RPS Scotland will follow up the discussion by writing to the Cabinet Secretary to request a meeting to discuss achieving protected learning time, the forthcoming results of our workforce wellbeing survey, and positive examples of how pharmacy teams have improved the well-being of their teams," said the society.

The NHS England last week released a survey report on the involvement of pharmacy professionals in research, and proposed the implementation of a clinical academic training pathway for pharmacy professionals by 2030. Recommendations were made to support the embedding of research at all stages of a pharmacy professional's career. The report presented the findings of two surveys that NHS England launched in May 2022, one for individual pharmacy professionals and one for organisations, calling for evidence on clinical academic careers in pharmacy. The survey found that only a minority of the pharmacy workforce take up clinical research training opportunities. "Just under a quarter of individual respondents had applied for the National Institute of Health and Care Research (NIHR) or other research project grants, and just under half of the organisational survey respondents had supported individuals to apply for such a grant," it said.