Patient Access Clerk - Breast Surgery

Job description

Job responsibilities

Appointments

Receive and register referral letters from multiple sources on PAS in accordance with Trust policy. Recording referrals received from the Referral Management System in an accurate and timely manner.

To ensure that referral letters are processed, appointments then made and communicated to the patients within the timescale set down in the Cancer Waiting Times directive and the Trusts Access Policy.

Add patients to the clinic list, send appointments or acknowledgement letters as appropriate within defined clinic rules and procedures.

To provide a friendly patient focused service for appointment enquiries in person and by telephone.

When required take requests from secretaries and nursing/medical staff to make appropriate follow-up appointments ensuring that any interpreting or additional requirements are ascertained and recording the reason for the appointment booking. Ensure details are accurately recorded on PAS.

Receive and respond to telephone calls from patients wishing to change or cancel their appointments. Advising patients of importance of attending where appropriate and ensuring requests for changes are within waiting times targets.

Make telephone bookings from staff working in clinical areas e.g. ward clerks or A&E Dept.

To autonomously process all referrals Cancer Target and routine patients in accordance with the Access Policy. Maintain and ensure that at all time appointments are offered within the government target waiting times for outpatient appointments.

Reception Duties

Greet patients in a courteous and helpful manner. Establish and confirm each patients demographic details and update PAS as necessary.

Direct patients to waiting areas or other clinics and departments as required.

Liaise with transport when patients arrive by hospital transport.

Inform patients of approximate clinic waiting times, and in conjunction with clinical staff keep patients informed as and when situations change.

Issue follow-up appointments when required, including identifying and supplying relevant information / literature.

Complete all outcome coding information on PAS and ensure that clinics are fully reconciled. This includes confirming attendance, completing outcome, and inputting all the data recorded on clinic attendance sheets.

To coordinate the running of reception while resolving queries from the Consultants and Nursing staff, patients and members of the public ensuring that all receive an equitable service in a timely manner.

Communication

To engage in collaborative problem solving with co-workers and staff and other outside agencies.

To ensure that all telephone and email communications are dealt with in a timely and professional manner.

To ensure that all telephone voicemail messages are updated, clear and concise and that all messages are dealt with promptly.

To ensure that when on leave an out of office message is left detailing who to contact.

To function as a team player, being considerate and flexible, taking the needs of peers into consideration.

To exercise discretion to ensure that patient confidentiality is maintained and a professional, respectful hospital environment exists at all times.

To provide and receive complex and sensitive information via telephone, face to face, or in writing, some of which may be contentious in nature, requiring interpersonal and communication skills to promptly assess each situation, escalating to or seeking advice from a health professional as necessary.

To have good written and oral communication skills to enable clear and concise information, explanations and instructions are provided.

To answer a range of complex and sensitive patient enquiries promptly and politely (via telephone and in person) and where necessary refer to the Patient Access Manager for advice/support.

To advise patients of any delays to being seen for their appointment/treatment within the service.

To ensure that all patients are given the opportunity to speak to a senior manager if they wish to make a complaint about the service that they have received.

To be able to establish and maintain effective communication with all members of the public, including those with challenging behaviour, learning disabilities and those whose first language is not English, ensuring interpreters are booked for appointments as soon as the need is identified to comply with legislation.

To liaise with clinical /nursing staff, porters and ambulance staff.

To deal with all non-clinical queries in an efficient and courteous manner using judgement and prioritisation.

To develop and maintain effective working relationships with nursing, medical, Allied Health Professionals and managerial staff within the department.

To work with colleagues to ensure that relevant information is disseminated effectively and appropriately in a timely manner.

To take clear and accurate messages and ensure prompt delivery to the appropriate person.

Please note: This role does not meet the minimum criteria for visa sponsorship under the current UK immigration rules, which set specific salary and skill thresholds. As such, we are unable to provide sponsorship for this post. Applicants will therefore need to already have the right to work in the UK to be considered. We include this information at the outset to provide clarity and avoid unnecessary inconvenience for applicants.

If you are applying using a Graduate visa as your right to work, you must have a minimum of 18 months remaining on your visa at time of application.

Person Specification

Experience and Skills

Essential

• oSubstantial experience of admin/clerical work
• oExperience of working with the general public
• oComputer literate with knowledge of Microsoft products to include Word & Excel
• oTo be able to handle complex enquiries from patients, some of whom may distressed/anxious about their care
• oAbility to work unsupervised, plan, prioritise and manage own workload

Desirable

• oExperience in a hospital or healthcare setting

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion

Essential

• Evidence of having championed diversity in previous roles
• Evidence of having undertaken own development to improve understanding of equalities issues.

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Employer details

Employer name

University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust (279)

Address

Park Centre for Breast Care

177 Preston Road

Brighton

BN1 6AG

Employer's website

https://www.uhsussex.nhs.uk/ (Opens in a new tab)