Tools and frameworks

Several resources are available to support community pharmacy teams in implementing AMS principles. One of the most important is the TARGET (Treat Antibiotics Responsibly, Guidance, Education, Tools) Toolkit.

Developed by the UK Health Security Agency (formerly Public Health England) and the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP), the TARGET toolkit provides a range of resources, including patient leaflets and guidance on appropriate antibiotic prescribing. Some resources have been specifically adapted for the community pharmacy setting. See the e-learning hub on the RCGP website (rcgp.org.uk) as well as the Community Pharmacy England (cpe.org.uk) website for details. The resources include:

• Treating Your Infection leaflets for UTIs and RTIs: Designed to help patients understand infection durations and self care strategies
• Antibiotic Checklist: For use with patients/carers collecting antibiotics, this checklist is available in many different languages
• Antibiotic Prescription Screening and Counselling sheet: designed to help support information provided to patients, this includes how to take antibiotics and their common side-effects. The sheet also summarises information from the British National Formulary (BNF) and Electronic Medicines Compendium (EMC) and can support pharmacy teams when screening antibiotic prescriptions.

Many of these resources are summarised in this eight minute video, watch here: youtube.com/watchv=wgqgqZIv8n4. By incorporating these tools into their practice, pharmacies can ensure consistent messaging and enhance their role in AMS.