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Team Tuesday is a chance for your pharmacy team to learn together. On the first Tuesday of the month after Pharmacy Magazine and Training Matters arrive in-store, get together for a training session based on selected content in the magazines. This support column is designed to help pharmacists structure and lead a Team Tuesday training session.

Subject: e-cigarettes

This column provides pharmacists with a training resource for support staff. Refer to the relevant Team Tuesday focus feature in Training Matters on e-cigarettes and work through the training exercises and quiz questions together with your team.

The answers to the MCQs are in the corresponding edition of Pharmacy Magazine.

Reflection

• Can I explain how e-cigarettes function and what they are?
• Am I clear on the evidence base with regard to e-cigarettes?
• Do I confuse the evidence with my own thinking?
• Can I discuss this evidence clearly with customers?
• Should we sell e-cigarettes in the pharmacy? On what will we base our decision? Which brands would we stock and why? Would we focus on licensed products?
• What do I feel about the place of e-cigarettes in the context of NRT products and my role in a health promoting pharmacy?

Training checklist

Ensure your support staff understand the following key points:

• How hard it is to stop smoking
• The specific health benefits of quitting or reducing smoking
• The evidence base for and against e-cigarettes
• Expert views on e-cigarettes
• The future licensing of e-cigarettes and what this will mean
• When to refer to the pharmacist.

Action. I will:

• Digest the MHRA and RPS guidance on e-cigarettes and consider using my learning from this document as an entry for my CPD
• Ensure that the pharmacy team feels confident and is able to provide information on e-cigarettes and NRT
• Train my pharmacy assistants to ensure that they can meet the points in this training checklist.

Practice points

• Does you local trust or health authority have a view or a statement on e-cigarettes?
• Speak to a smoker who is using e cigarettes. How long have they been using them? Why are they using them? Have they been able to reduce their use of tobacco cigarettes? What did you learn from this conversation? Discuss in the pharmacy team.