The General Pharmaceutical Council is looking for volunteers to test its continuing fitness to practise (CFtP) framework.

The invitation marks a move away from the current CPD recording template and towards a framework that is easier, less repetitive and more meaningful for pharmacists and pharmacy technicians.

As part of the work, the GPhC is keen to hear about ways in which registrants discuss with their peers any issues affecting their practice and how they might build a portfolio of evidence that demonstrates the impact of their work.

The test runs until September, with participants accessing a number of forms online to record planned and unplanned CPD, as well as peer-to-peer activities and evidence. Each completed page corresponds to a single entry, although the idea is to move away from a set number of records per year as a measure of fitness to practise.

At the end of the four-month testing period, GPhC assessors and the regulator’s CFtP team will evaluate submissions for content amount and type from a feasibility perspective. Participants will be given the opportunity to provide direct feedback
on the process and suggest improvements.

The Royal Pharmaceutical Society is working with the GPhC on the CFtP project, which is expected to go live across the profession in 2017, and has asked all pharmacists associated with the RPS’s Faculty or Foundation professional development programmes – around 500 in total – to volunteer for the test.

Current thinking is that Faculty membership is likely to, as a minimum, satisfy the GPhC’s CFtP requirements, meaning that no additional documentation would be required.