Band 7 Clinical Specialist Occupational Therapist
12 months fixed term - Maternity Cover Hours/week: 37.5
An exciting opportunity has arisen for a Band 7 Occupational Therapist who relishes the opportunity to provide professional leadership, patient facing contact, and to contribute to service improvement and innovation to join the Home First Team at St Peter’s Hospital.
The Home First Team covers the “front door” of the hospital: Accident and Emergency, Clinical Assessment Unit and Older Persons Assessment Unit and brings together acute hospital services with Adult Social Care and District & Borough Services whilst maintaining strong links with Urgent Community Response Team to improve the interface between acute and community services and the pathway for older adults.
The successful candidate will be supported by the Clinical Lead for Home First and work closely with a multidisciplinary team to provide timely and comprehensive therapy assessments with a transdisciplinary approach, facilitate rapid discharge of medically optimised patients and avoid unnecessary hospital admissions. You will also be expected to participate in the supervision and development of junior staff and demonstrate enthusiasm and the ability to balance clinical and operational demands.
There will be scope to develop your clinical and leadership skills through formal supervision and appraisal. Internal and external training opportunities exist. Staff wellbeing is also paramount to the Trust.
Act as a specialist occupational therapist to ensure high standards of practice across all areas covered
To be responsible for the daily management of the Home First team and enhanced MDT to ensure patient flow
To provide highly specialist assessment and interventions
To make sound clinical judgements with regards to risk-weighted discharge planning within short time frames
To expedite discharges in a timely manner, in collaboration with other MDT members
To provide education and teaching to therapists and the wider MDT acting as a specialist resource
To supervise junior staff and students from both Physiotherapy and Occupational Therapy disciplines
To participate in supporting the ‘Front of House’ weekend rota.
For further information, please contact Alison Williamson, Clinical Lead for Home First Team at alison.williamson1@nhs.net OR Kelly Stevenson, Inpatient Therapy Manager for Physio and Occupational Therapy on kelly.stevenson6@nhs.net
Ashford and St. Peters Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust serves a population of more than 410,000 people living in North-West Surrey, parts of Hounslow and beyond.
Over 3,700 highly trained doctors, nurses, midwives, therapists, healthcare scientists and other support staff make up our workforce, providing a wide range of services across our two hospital sites, Ashford, Surrey and St Peter’s, Chertsey, Surrey.
We also run many specialist clinics in the community and local community hospitals and other healthcare facilities.
Our vision is to be one of the best healthcare Trusts in the country. There has never been a better time to join us in the NHS at ASPH. We are committed to providing continuous professional development and flexibility to shape our workforce around our patient care.
We are expanding our theatres at Ashford Hospital and moving towards this becoming our dedicated elective centre. We want to create a state-of-the-art centre for excellence for planned surgical procedures.
We can offer you the full range of NHS benefits/discounts and in addition:
Excellent pension scheme and annual leave entitlement
On-site Nurseries
On-site staff cafes
On-site parking
Support in career development
Salary Sacrifice schemes including wage stream, lease cars, Cycle to Work schemes and home electronics
Adverts may close early, so applicants are encouraged to submit an application as soon as possible.

Education

• To supervise and lead on the professional development and training of occupational therapists and other members of the team in the specialist field
• To undertake regular supervision with individuals to support clinical reasoning and to undertake patient sessions as facilitator and participant
• To participate in any training sessions as a recipient and facilitator
• To disseminate any training received to other staff and healthcare professionals
• To be actively involved in special interest groups in order to share and disseminate knowledge to colleague

Clinical

• To work as an autonomous clinician to undertake a significant specialist clinical caseload and undertake highly skilled assessments of patients with complex problems
• Use excellent investigative, analytical and diagnostic skills to assess complex patients
• Utilise clear clinical reasoning skills to adopt a wide range of treatment options and skills to formulate specialised programmes of care and discharge plans
• Hold expert knowledge regarding community services to support safe and effective discharges and make referrals to other disciplines and agencies as appropriate e.g. Primary Care Services, Adult Social Care
• To support other less experienced staff with their patients
• To achieve and maintain a high standard of clinical care using evidence based practice, keeping up to date with clinical developments, analysing current research, discussing and implementing changes in clinical practice and encouraging this throughout the team
• To be responsible for setting and monitoring of standards and policies of clinical practice in the team and evaluate outcomes
• To take responsibility for the writing of evidence based clinical guidelines and protocols as appropriate to the speciality and for regularly reviewing and updating those guidelines
• To be professionally and legally responsible and accountable for all aspects of professional activities working within codes of practice and professional guidelines
• To demonstrate physical ability to carry out assessments and interventions including manual and therapeutic handling techniques. This involves frequent light to moderate physical effort
• To maintain accurate records in line with the College of Occupational Therapy standards and Trust and service standards and policies
• To attend relevant board rounds, meetings as appropriate in order to ensure appropriate management and effective and timely discharge of patients

Communications and Engagement

• To be able to communicate complex and sensitive information to patients, carers and other staff including imparting unwelcome news relating to their rehabilitation potential
• To use a range of verbal and non-verbal communication tools to communicate effectively and sensitively with patients in order to progress treatment programmes and discharge plans. This may include patients who have difficulties in understanding or communicating
• To assess patients’ understanding of treatment and discharge proposals, gain valid consent and have the capacity to work within a legal framework with patients who lack capacity to consent to treatment
• To communicate effectively with all disciplines involved in a patient’s care, both those from within the organisation and those outside to ensure efficient multidisciplinary working
• To maintain accurate records in line with COT, Trust and service standards and policies and ensure patient records of directly supervised staff also comply with these standards
• To attend staff meetings and actively participate ensuring understanding of information imparted
• To take responsibility for leading local team meetings to ensure accurate and timely information dissemination
• To initiate and maintain good contact with local services both internal and external i.e. Adult Social Care, CSH Surrey
• To ensure timely and effective communication with the Clinical Lead for Home First or Therapy Manager for Occupational Therapy on all operational or professional matters

Leadership or managerial

• To effectively plan the daily management of a caseload of patients and ensure team working within SPH and across site, effectively prioritise, plan and manage their caseloads too
• To be able to prioritise clinical and managerial work and balance other patient related and professional activities as required
• To be able to manage potentially stressful and upsetting or emotional situations in an empathetic manner
• To supervise junior and senior staff and therapy assistants where appropriate
• To participate in the appraisal scheme as an appraiser and to be appraised
• To maintain the high standards of the service by contributing to the individual team and service objectives
• To contribute to the overall strategic view of the in patient service at ASPH, by monitoring and evaluating activity
• To initiate and lead service improvement and projects to develop services in line with recent NHS initiatives and guidance and in response to demand
• To demonstrate a high level of understanding of clinical governance and clinical risk

Education

• To supervise and lead on the professional development and training of occupational therapists and other members of the team in the specialist field
• To undertake regular supervision with individuals to support clinical reasoning and to undertake patient sessions as facilitator and participant
• To participate in any training sessions as a recipient and facilitator
• To disseminate any training received to other staff and healthcare professionals
• To be actively involved in special interest groups in order to share and disseminate knowledge to colleagues

Technology or system support

• To maintain timely and accurate statistical information as required by senior staff and managers
• To be responsible for the accurate input of clinical information onto the trust IT system
• To keep up to date with advances in technology

Research/Audit/Quality

• To regularly participate in and lead on appropriate work related research/evaluation projects and to be aware of current research relevant to the speciality
• To participate in and initiate clinical audit and the evaluation of clinical effectiveness in line with Trust Policies
• To evaluate your own clinical effectiveness
• To ensure relevant topics are included in annual clinical governance and service plans
• To undertake and present relevant evidence based projects

General responsibilities

• To support the department and organisation by carrying out any other duties that reasonably fit within the broad scope of a job of this grade and type of work