Jackie Smith is a pharmaceutical advisor working one day a week in community pharmacy and a supplementary prescriber.

“Towards Prescribing Practice offers readers a comprehensive guide to the principles and practice of prescribing. The subject matter relates to the government content standards for study programmes and takes its cue from recent research in prescribing and patient care in practice. This book embraces the perennial core principles of prescribing practice, management and leadership.”

The title of the book gives little away as to its contents. I began my review by asking myself as a non-medical prescriber what  would I expect to find in its pages? What would I be looking for? With the variety of healthcare professionals now qualifying as supplementary and independent prescribers can this book provide a universal source of information? It soon became apparent to me that the answer was yes.

To train as a prescriber requires a background knowledge of pharmacology. The first chapter clearly takes the reader through the fundamentals of pharmacokinetics/dynamics, but more importantly points to the practical consequences. The inclusion of work-based tasks also helps to consolidate the theoretical text and the use of well chosen coloured illustrations are an unexpected enhancement.

The more subjective aspects of prescribing around decision making and consultation are illustrated particularly well by the use of scenarios and quotes and this is indeed the whole approach of the book. It cleverly combines valuable information with thought provoking discussion points and is peppered with useful summary tables and tasks. For the supplementary prescriber there are illustrations of clinical management plans which clarify their structure and function and provide useful examples.

The book finishes with three chapters written by specialist practitioners in mental health, palliative care and emergency care settings. This constitutes approximately one-third of the book and clearly is of value to those working in these fields. However, issues are discussed which arise in any therapeutic area such as consent, licensing concordance etc, consequently being of interest to others also.

My one criticism of the book is the chapter on legislation and accountability. Here I would like to have seen more discussion around licensing and off label prescribing with examples to illustrate these difficult areas instead of a number of illustrations of specimen prescriptions which are in danger of dating.

In summary, would I find this book a useful addition to my bookshelf? The answer is yes I would – as a very readable and thought provoking enhancement to my practice.