In June, amongst the bustling Covid-19 vaccine clinics Tracey Bullard the head of transformation at OneNorwich Practices was so in awe of the work she'd seen the pharmacy team doing she decided to nominate them for an award at the General Practice Awards which have been running since 2008.

Following Tracey’s nomination, the team has been shortlisted for the ‘Extended Practice Team Member of the Year Award’. The award seeks to recognise a member of the wider general practice team who has had a positive impact on improving patient care, practice efficiency, team morale or clinical workload in their practice or area.

The 17 Norwich Primary Care Network (PCN) pharmacy team members were redeployed at the beginning of the pandemic away from their normal roles to work in three dedicated Covid-19 vaccine clinics in Norwich which allowed the rest of Norwich Practices to continue seeing their patients as normal.

Tracey Bullard, Head of Transformation said “The team, who were anxious but keen to take on the challenge undertook their training and having never delivered a vaccine, quickly got up to date with the new protocols and procedures. They were divided across three designated sites and quickly demonstrated how competent they were with over 180,000 vaccines being delivered by early September.

Working long hours, weekends and evenings the team also did home and care home visits, visited local mosques and outreached to the homeless and hostels.”  

Dr Jeanine Smirl, GP and lead clinician for the PCN added “I am extremely proud of our PCN clinical pharmacy team. I honestly don't know how we would have managed without them these past two years. They have worked tirelessly to support practices and to helped us deliver a very successful Covid-19 vaccination programme.

The team were also instrumental in the delivery of the "Covid Protect" project in Norwich and managed hundreds of clinical and medication queries to support our most vulnerable shielded patients. They have worked long and hard, given up weekends and evenings with utmost professionalism and good cheer. I wish the team the best of luck and congratulate them for this very well-deserved recognition.“

The Awards Ceremony will be taking place on 10th December 2021 in London.

For more information about the awards see here.