Quality Management

NHS England Workforce, Transformation & Education (WT&E) Pharmacy London Team use the multi-professional quality standards set out in Health Education England (HEE) Quality Framework as a basis for managing the quality of our programme provision. These standards are mapped to the General Pharmaceutical Council’s (GPhC) Standards for the Initial Education and Training of Pharmacists and are, generally, applicable to programmes for all pharmacy trainees. We are responsible for the quality management of the Foundation Trainee Pharmacist Programme that we deliver and we adhere to principles set out in the HEE Quality Framework for all other training that we commission or deliver.

Quality Reviews

The six review methods to review quality within placement providers are:

  • Urgent Concern Review
  • Risk-based Review
  • Multi-professional Review
  • Programme Review
  • Pathway Review
  • Thematic Review

The Urgent Concern Review takes place following the escalation of risk requiring immediate investigation and action. This review is held at short notice and is highly focused and specific. The focus of the Risk-based Review is dependent on the level of risk associated with the learning environment and is defined by a group of learners or trainers.


The Multi-Professional Review takes the form of an onsite visit and is a cyclical review of the whole learning environments.

The focus of the review is on educational governance, exploring the quality of education and training across a placement provider, and including all professions which may require focus on a specific area of practice. This review may also be used where there is a heightened organisational risk and it may take place more frequently than stipulated where required.


The Programme Review considers the quality of a programme of learning across placement providers for learners within a particular area of practice. The focus of this review is a professional group within a curricula context.

A Programme Review has been undertaken for all pharmacy London NHS Trusts over the last few years.

Quality Management in Pharmacy

Trusts who support trainees are expected to hold Local Faculty Group (LFG) meetings and document these formally. They should periodically check to ensure that they are meeting the ten standards that are mapped to the HEE Quality Framework. The LFG Report template, along with several other LFG resources, is available for EPDs to access via in the Pharmacy Educators section of Moodle.

Local Faculty Groups

As part of a move to develop education governance in pharmacy, all Trusts are now required to have a Pharmacy Local Faculty Group (LFG). The purpose of Local Faculty Groups is to:

  • ensure there are systems and processes in place to develop learning programmes, teaching and assessment for pre-registration pharmacy trainees
  • ensure there is leadership, management and administrative support to underpin high quality learning environments
  • ensure teaching, learning and assessment is clearly linked to national syllabus and curriculum
  • review the pharmacy LFG report and Education Strategy

Trainee Feedback

LFGs should also consider trainee feedback in improving their systems and processes.

Each year, we conduct an end of year survey for pre-registration trainees and early careers pharmacists. Each site can view an anonymised summary of the feedback and access information via the NETS reporting tool (except for sites where there are fewer than three trainees).