COVID-19 Vaccination programme training update

Updated 4th February 2021

With the increasing and urgent calls to get community pharmacists involved in the Covid-19 vaccination programme, Elen Searle Head of Pharmacy at New Directions, provides a training update to anyone who would like to be involved, if/when the opportunity arises, to ensure you are appropriately trained in line with the requirements to deliver the various vaccines asap.

Scotland are yet to confirm if they will have country-specific requirements for locum pharmacists, however, Health Education England have confirmed the following training courses and learning sessions are available to all healthcare professionals, UK wide, and there is also a Wales specific module available on the HEIW website. Please see further details on all training courses and modules below.

Health Education England

Information from their website below:

Health Education England e-Learning for Healthcare has worked in partnership with Public Health England and NHS England, and NHS Improvement to develop the COVID-19 Vaccination e-learning programme.  The e-learning programme is designed to provide the health and care workforce involved in the national COVID-19 vaccination programme with the knowledge they need to confidently promote high uptake of the vaccine and deliver the vaccine programme effectively.

The e-learning sessions describe the national COVID-19 vaccination programme for England. Most of the information in the sessions will be relevant for those involved in the programme throughout the UK and Crown Dependencies. However, those undertaking the programme in Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales and the Crown Dependencies should be aware that some details as to how the programme will be delivered may be different. Vaccinators should therefore ensure that they refer to any country-specific information available, so they are familiar with the details of the programme for the country they are practising in.  This e-learning programme provides theoretical training. 

Please note, practical training in vaccine administration, and assessment and sign-off competency is also required before administering the COVID-19 vaccine.

Learners should also complete the vaccine specific session(s), which will provide more detailed information about the vaccine(s). The assessment sessions should be completed after each knowledge session.  More vaccine-specific sessions will be added as and when more COVID-19 vaccines become available.

We highly recommend completing the additional e-learning sessions including Basic Life Support, anaphylaxis and statutory and mandatory training (if you haven’t already completed these).

You will be required to provide evidence of completing all the training courses and e-learning sessions listed above, in order to be considered for delivering the Covid vaccines.

To access the COVID-19 Vaccination e-learning programme, please click here.

Please note that you will need to register on the site to create a learning account and access the training.

Wales specific module

We have received confirmation of a Wales specific Covid-19 vaccination module available via the HEIW website.  To ensure you have the correct level of training to get involved in the vaccination roll-out, should the opportunity arise, please complete this module at your earliest convenience.

Supporting information from their website:

The covid-19 vaccination module is now available to access through NESA. You may now complete the necessary training and submit your accreditation forms to shared services. Please note, the enhanced service has not yet been fully commissioned in some health boards so check with your health board before providing this service.

The learning resources and flowcharts detail how to access the training and assessments required and how to contact Learning@NHSWales if you are having issues. HEIW have not developed these learning materials so if you have specific queries with regards to accessing the training, please contact the details under the learning resources pages.

Information on how to access NESA, can be located on the ‘ How To Guides ‘ menu option on link provided above.

For anyone in Scotland, we will keep you updated if any country-specific requirements are announced.

Register today

If you would like to be contacted about work opportunities to support the vaccine roll-out, or any other locum work we have available throughout the UK, register with us today.