Pharmacists are now allowed to do more — but the system around them isn't configured for it yet. We are designing the workflow, decision support, and risk-sharing structure that extended scope actually requires.
Community pharmacy now has authority for a range of new clinical activities — vaccinations, prescribing for minor ailments, screening, structured medication reviews. But the workflow, information systems and clinical decision support around the pharmacist were designed for the old scope. The new authorities land in the old configuration.
A pharmacist under extended scope is now expected to make clinical calls that previously sat with a GP — to prescribe, to triage, to identify red flags, to refer onward. The training is in place. The legislation is in place. But the systems supporting the pharmacist were never built for these decisions.
There is no integrated patient record at the pharmacy bench. There is no clinical decision support tuned to the new scope. There is no clear protocol for when and how to refer onward — and no shared workflow with the GPs the pharmacist now works alongside.
So the system asks the pharmacist to carry expanded clinical risk with the same workflow they had when their scope was much narrower. Predictably, uptake of new authorities is slow, and outcomes are uneven.
AutoConsult is being designed to give the pharmacist what extended scope actually requires: structured patient identification, AI-assisted clinical decision support, integrated referral pathways, and shared accountability with primary care.
Patients needing extended-scope services were noticed opportunistically — when they happened to walk in or ask.
Systematic patient identification: the system surfaces who in the pharmacy's catchment would benefit from a vaccination, screening, or structured review.
Clinical recognition relied on the pharmacist's training alone, with no patient context beyond what was in front of them.
AI-assisted clinical decision support draws on integrated patient records to flag context, contraindications, and likely best path forward.
Risk sat with the prescribing GP under the old scope. Under the new scope, it shifted abruptly to the pharmacist — without shared infrastructure.
Risk is explicitly shared: pharmacist holds first-contact decision, primary care holds escalation, with structured protocols and shared visibility connecting them.
The pharmacist made calls without structured decision support, often choosing the more conservative path — refer onward — even where extended scope was appropriate.
The call stays with the pharmacist, but with clinical context, decision support, and clear referral pathways — extended scope used confidently, not cautiously.
AutoConsult is in early co-design with SA Pharmacy, SA Health, and community pharmacy partners. The work is being scoped against the next MRFF NCRI primary-care round — a pipeline candidate, not yet pilot.
As with every Sandpit configuration, the goal is to test the design in a live, governed environment before any commitment to scale — so that scope expansion produces real capacity rather than added burden.
AutoConsult is in early co-design. Outcomes will be defined as the configuration is shaped with profession and primary-care partners.
Authority without workflow is just a longer task list. The Sandpit's job is to make sure the scope expansion comes with the configuration to use it — so that policy intent translates into real capacity, not real burden.
Each Sandpit configuration applies the same four-operation decomposition to a different capacity problem. What stays constant is the method.
Bring it to the Sandpit. We'll diagnose where capacity is lost, configure what should change, and test it in a governed live setting before you commit at scale.