Hi Mad-Footers

I thought I'd share some tips to others trying to apply for endorsement. My endorsement was confirmed last week and it has been a long road travelling down pathway 1 of the endorsement process. And in a few weeks the board will start their new processes, but these are some of the things I learned that they want to see in your case studies.

Tip 1 - if your patient in your case study is female make a standard statement about their reproductive and lactation status.

Tip 2 - if you are still using pathway 1 and your case studies are 'fictitious' still put a date observed and a prescriber observed on your case study

Tip 3 - make a standard statement on each case study that you have checked all possible known drug drug and drug food and drug disease interactions using a standard database such as micromedix

Tip 4 - State why you have selected a particular medication in the class you have selected

Tip 5 - The text used in the current formulary (which changes on August 1) is very confusing and without punctuation. It can be open to interpretation. The board interpret colchicine prescriptions as being a single dose only and for a max of 24 hours. I had read it to mean "if you wanted to prescribe more than 24 hours worth then you needed a shared care arrangement". But the board interpretation is "you can only prescribe a single dose and it must be in a shared care arrangement". Without punctuation their formulary can mean both things depending on how you read it.

Tip 6 - Make a standard statement on each case study about gaining financial consent from your patient and that they understood that they may be able to obtain the medication cheaper from another prescriber

Tip 7 - Ensure that when you mention allergies you note how severe the allergies are

Tip 8 - Mention how you store and obtain medicines that you administer in the case studies i.e. locked drug cabinet that authorised prescribers only have access to.

Tip 9 - Show your calculations for MSD in your case study for local anaesthetics, even when you've administered less than the MSD

Tip 10 - Make  a standard statement in each case study about education provided to the patient. I stated that the consumer medicines information was provided to the patient and discussed and they were specifically warned to seek assistance if they experienced.......

Tip 11 - Make reference to your use of an Antimicrobial Stewardship Program in your antibiotic and anti fungal case studies

Tip 12 - In your prescribing locations statement ensure you mention the NPS prescriber competencies and how you have obtained them and display them in your practice

Tip 13 - It takes a very long time. I initially submitted my application in 2012. At that point I had 6 months left before my masters was 7 years old. It was rejected as I hadn't included 40 case studies, despite the fact that the pathway 1 documents don't say that I was supposed to submit any case studies. At the time I didn't have the capacity to write the case studies before my masters expired so I gave up. In 2016 I re-did my masters level pharmacology and in Jan 17 I wrote the 40 case studies. I gave it to my two referees and between them it took them 8 months to read all the documents and sign every page. I then submitted to the board in August 17 and it has taken them until July 18 to endorse my rego.

The irony of the whole situation is that my two referees (a professor of infectious diseases and a professor of medicine)both said that they learned things about medications and prescribing from reading my case studies. And that they didn't require nearly as much pharmacology knowledge from their medical students and trainees. I also got a nurse practitioner to read over the work before I submitted and she was flabbergasted by the level of detail and the volume required compared to her own endorsement which only required completion of masters, a CV, and a portfolio showing what she had been doing at work for the last 3 years.

Good luck to everyone applying for endorsement. Hope this is some help.

Ian Reid