Consultant Ophthalmology in Eye Casualty

at  Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust

This is a replacement 10 PA post for a Consultant Ophthalmology with an interest in Urgent Eye Care and complimentary sub-specialty at the Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust.
The Simulation date for the post will be 25th June 2024 and the Interview date is the 11th July 2024.
The post holder will share clinical and managerial leadership within the Ophthalmology service with the present consultants.
The Ophthalmology Department is part of the Head and Neck Directorate, which is part of the Planned Care Group.
The department undertakes approximately 7000 day-case procedures and provides approximately 100,000 outpatient attendances and over 20,000 Eye Casualty attendances per annum, serving a population of approximately 1 million.
At the Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading the service is located in the Eye Block and includes the Eye Outpatient Department and the dedicated Eye Day Case Unit. Inpatient care is provided on Dorrell Ward which provides care for Head and Neck patients. There are dedicated eye theatres.
The Prince Charles Eye Unit in Windsor is on the site of the King Edward VII Hospital. There are two fully commissioned ophthalmic theatres within the unit undertaking day case admissions and minor operations.
Ophthalmic Accident and Emergency services are provided in both the Royal Berkshire Hospital and Prince Charles Eye Unit. There are dedicated intra-vitreal injection treatment suites on both sites.
The West Berkshire Community Hospital in Newbury provides dedicated eye outpatient clinic facilities and theatres.
The outpatient facilities at all sites include up to date equipment. The Royal Berkshire Hospital is a Digital Trust using Cerner Millennium EPR. The Ophthalmology department is paperlight, using Medisoft for all clinical records. Medisoft is closely integrated with EPR.

CLINICAL RESPONSIBILITIES:

To provide Ophthalmology services with a special interest in Accident and Emergency Ophthalmology in both inpatient and outpatient settings. We are keen to develop new ways of working some which may have been learned during the COVID-19 Pandemic period aiming to reduce footfall in a walk in casualty and we need innovative leadership to do this.
To provide enthusiastic clinical leadership for the A and E Ophthalmology services, including responsibility for supervision of junior medical staff and teaching, training and assessment of medical, nursing and allied health professional staff within the service.
To provide ophthalmology services in an additional sub-specialty area if desired by the applicant. The subspecialty should complement either acute ophthalmology care or other the wider department.
To liaise with the community providers and deliver integrated primary care services to support eye casualty.
To liaise with other specialty services such as Neurology, Stroke teams, Orthoptists and paediatricians, Radiology, Maxillofacial to provide optimal pathways for patient care and review
To innovate virtual working methods for general clinic patients
To deliver high volume cataract lists and support surgical training in the department.
To provide on-call cover for Ophthalmology services on an approximately 1 in13
To assess performance against national standards quarterly and identify areas requiring improvement.
To ensure that all clinical information systems are completed appropriately.

MANAGEMENT RESPONSIBILITIES:

Active participation in monthly clinical governance/audit and Consultant meetings within the department. Participation in short listing and interviewing doctors joining the department. Performing investigations for serious incidents, and authoring root cause analysis reports. Investigating and responding to departmental complaints within the Trust framework and timelines. Taking on additional roles throughout the Consultant career - to include College Tutor, Educational Supervisor, Clinical lead for clinical Governance and Audit, Departmental Clinical Lead etc.
Participation and involvement in meetings and other business plans and development in the Ophthalmology service