Understanding and Prescribing Chemotherapy

Course Overview
This course was created for all health care professionals involved in prescribing chemotherapy or looking after patients on those treatments.
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  • Written by experts
  • Introductory
  • 100% online
  • Video content
  • Multiple choice quiz
  • Approx. 8 hours to complete
  • Completion certificate
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About this course
It includes accessible introductions to how different chemotherapeutic drugs work and how to manage their side effects, plus a bank of prescribing scenarios for doctors and pharmacists to practice clinical decision making.
The modules have been designed to support health care professionals involved either directly in prescribing systemic anti-cancer therapies (SACT) or looking after patients on these treatments. They are designed to provide an introduction or refresher to the basic principles of SACT prescribing. They are not designed to give clinical direction in patient management or replace local guidelines and recommendations, which should be consulted when making prescribing decisions.
The more advanced content is directly aligned to the curriculae for medical oncology, clinical oncology and haemotology for specialist trainees, and to the Royal Pharmaceutical Society Cancer Care Curriculum and the BOPA competency framework for specialist oncology pharmacists.

Module 1: Background to Chemotherapy
In this module you will review the key principles of systemic anticancer therapy (SACT). The goal is to become familiar with common systemic anti-cancer drugs, including their place in therapy, their mechanisms, and their side effects.
Module 2: Targeted Therapies
In this module you will cover an introduction to targeted therapies, understanding and awareness of signalling pathways, and understanding angiogenesis.
Module 3: Side Effects and Supportive Therapies
In this module you will become familiar with common systemic anti-cancer drugs including roles, mechanisms, and side effects.
Module 4: Introduction to Practical Prescribing
In this module you will review the assessment of response to therapy and the likely adverse effects of agents in common usage. The aim is to become familiar with the common systemic anti-cancer drugs including roles, mechanisms and side effects.
Module 5: Practical Prescribing Case Studies
This module includes questions around the principles of prescribing systemic anti-cancer therapies, patient assessment and management of oncology emergencies relevant to systemic therapies.

Course authors and designers

Sarah J.L. Payne

Honorary Medical Oncology Consultant
Sarah Payne is a medical oncologist, who started her training in cancer medicine in London in 2003. She completed her clinical training in medical oncology at St Bartholomew’s NHS Foundation Trust and latterly Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust (GSTT) in 2014, which included a 4 year PhD in oncology at the Barts Cancer Institute.

Lizzie Provis

Specialist Oncology Pharmacist
Lizzie Provis is a pharmacist with experience of working in hospitals in both the NHS and independent sector. She first began working in cancer services after completing her pharmacy training.

Kumud Kantilal

Macmillan Principal Pharmacist, Lead for Education and Training
Kumud Kantilal is a pharmacist with over eighteen years of experience working in NHS hospitals. She has extensive experience of delivering clinical pharmacy services to cancer patients and leading on education and training of multi-professionals working in cancer services.She was the lead cancer services pharmacist at Mount Vernon Cancer Centre (2005 – 2007), lead for cancer education and training at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust (2007 – 2016) and clinical lecturer at King’s College London (2014 – 2016).

Deepti Radia

Consultant Haematologist and Postgraduate Lead for Education
Deepti has been in her Haematology Consultant post at Guy’s & St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust since 2002. She is also Deputy Head of School of Pathology (London and South East). She is passionate about ensuring postgraduate medical education is delivered to the highest standards possible to enable the development of capable and competent professionals in a constantly changing NHS service. She has been actively involved in postgraduate haematology training and education since 1997

Florin Ivan

Project Manager, Learning Hub | King's Health Partners

UK Chemotherapy Board.

This course has been endorsed by the UK Chemotherapy Board.