Clinical Specialist Occupational Therapist

Job responsibilities

• To have responsibility for the Occupational Therapy Service to St Pancras Rehabilitation Unit Pathway 1 (Early supported discharge) and Henderson Court Reablement Flats. The post holder will also provide some In-reach to support the Band 7 Occupational Therapist leading the Rochester Wards (complex general rehabilitation) acting as a highly specialist Occupational Therapy advisor in rehabilitation for clients with complex needs.
• To promote maintain and further develop a high quality, efficient and effective Complex Rehabilitation Occupational Therapy Service within a multidisciplinary context and in accordance with the philosophy and operational policies for the Unit and Organisation.
• To provide advanced Occupational Therapy assessment and intervention of patients with complex needs.
• The post holder is expected to be an active member of the multi-disciplinary team.
• To be responsible for the supervision and monitoring of junior staff, including Band 6 and Band 5 OTs, Rehabilitation Assistants and OT students. Cross-disciple working to assist with supervision and monitoring of staff from other professions may be required.
• To maintain Continuing Professional Development for self and encourage in junior staff supervised.
• To be the clinical lead for the In-service training for Occupational Therapists and support with any Shared Skills Training within the unit and the Multi-pathology teams.
• To educate, train, liaise with and provide specialist advice to other disciplines, agencies, carers and families who are involved in patient care.
• To work effectively and flexibly within an interdisciplinary framework to provide an integrated approach to complex multi-pathology rehabilitation care programmes for clients.
• To be actively involved in planning, monitoring and implementing service clinical policies and patient care pathways.
• Provide specialist screening to the Intermediate Care beds iand advice and signposting to patients and their carers admitted to the bed bases.
• To be involved in clinical governance issues by keeping up-to-date with developments in rehabilitation, undertaking audit to evaluate practice and participating in research projects within OT, the wider MDT at a local and national level.

1. Clinical
2. To be professionally and legally accountable for all work undertaken.
3. To ensure that the client and/or their carer has an understanding of treatment protocols and gives informed consent to examination and treatment.
4. To undertake a comprehensive range of specialist neurological and/or complex multipathology occupational therapy assessments of clients with complex needs through subjective questioning, objective examination and the use of other resources.
5. To prioritise factors involved in the clients presenting condition through advanced clinical reasoning based on knowledge of current professional opinion, clients prognosis and other physical, social, emotional and mental health issues.
6. To agree client centred goals for treatment with clients and/or their carer and ensure that clients and carers are supported through their rehabilitation e.g. key worker embedded into practice, carer needs routinely identified.
7. To set and maintain a high standard of clinical practice which is evidence-based, and uses a range of standardised assessment and outcome measures, where appropriate.
8. To screen new admissions to the unit for clinical need and identify risk; including essential requirements for admission or re-signpost within North Central London.
9. To manage a caseload of clients with complex needs. To successfully monitor, evaluate and review occupational therapy treatment/interventions within a multi-disciplinary framework and to modify as necessary.
10. To be a specialist occupational therapy advisor to other professional colleagues in in-patients and as part of the discharge planning network of colleagues.
11. Develop and conduct Occupational Therapy intervention with clients assessing their occupational needs and addressing quality of life, and physical, cognitive, affective, social, and environmental issues utilising appropriate individual or group treatment modalities.
12. To use highly developed physical skills in client assessments and interventions, such as postural assessment, activities of daily living, upper limb splint fabrication and review.
13. To assist junior staff and other professionals in the management of complex cases and complete joint working interventions where clinically appropriate.
14. To ensure that activities are delegated appropriately to rehabilitation assistants
15. To work autonomously at times in isolated community situations which vary in relation to local socio-economic and multi-cultural needs.
16. To use comprehensive knowledge of other multi-disciplinary roles and external agencies to ensure effective referral management and achieve best client care.
17. To have the ability, knowledge and skills required for moving and handling people in hospital and community environments and supporting the formulation of a comprehensive risk assessments/ handovers.
18. To be physically able to install specialist occupational therapy equipment in client homes applying safe manual handling at all times, especially when doing so in restricted spaces
19. To advise and teach the relevant carers/health workers to participate in on-going rehabilitation care programmes for clients, as appropriate and ensure that self-management activities are embedded routinely into rehabilitation and transfer of care plans .
20. To participate in comprehensive multidisciplinary assessments of need across health and social care prior to transfer of care
21. To actively be involved in the development of new specialist clinical services within the Team.
22. To manage clinical risk in own caseload and ensure that other staff comply e.g. manual handling risk assessment and local policy regarding lone working.
23. To assist in the development of local best practice clinical uni-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary guidelines.
24. To act as a specialist resource for sign posting
25. To ensure that client and service records are recorded and maintained as per local guidelines and that IT databases are used.

EDUCATION and QUALIFICATIONS

Essential

• Degree in Occupational Therapy
• Registered with HPC
• Evidence of postgraduate training and continuing professional development

Desirable

• Evidence of postgraduate training and continuing professional development
• Evidence of postgraduate training and continuing professional development

PREVIOUS EXPERIENCE

Essential

• Considerable experience in physical health services, working in a range of settings including hospital and community
• Supervision of students
• Working in a multicultural environment
• Experience of CPA process and risk assessment.
• Experience of leadership in an MDT setting
• Experience of liaison within health services and external agencies.

Desirable

• Experience of working in a vocational role
• Involvement with the HR process

Skills

Essential

• Knowledge of OT theory related to practice
• Experience of supporting junior staff and OT students in specialist area
• Experience of supervision/consultation of OT staff working with complex clinical cases
• Staff Appraisal skills
• Knowledge and understanding of clinical governance
• Knowledge and understanding of national policies and legislation relevant to practice
• Ability to reflect on and critically appraise own performance
• Ability to critically appraise research findings to promote evidence based practice.
• Research/Audit skills - ability to implement and oversee research
• Use of standardised assessments
• Integration of models of practice
• Knowledge of employment and vocational issues, policies and legislation relevant to practice.
• Advanced verbal and written communication skills
• Teaching and presentation skills
• Basic IT skills
• Planning and decision making skills

Desirable

• Research/Audit experience
• Experience of service reviews based on best practice
• Knowledge of patient information systems

PROFESSIONAL CONDUCT

Essential

• Committed to multidisciplinary team work
• Committed to user involvement
• Ability to work independently, autonomously and prioritise effectively
• Flexible and responsive to a developing service
• Self-motivated
• Good time management skills
• Work in keeping with Code of Conduct and Professional Ethics
• Evidence of continued professional development

Desirable

• An ability to be innovative creative

Other

Essential

• Sickness (or attendance) record that is acceptable to the Trust
• Declared medically fit by the Occupational Health Department to perform duties for post
• Ability to understand and implement the Equal Opportunities Policy at a level appropriate for the job

Desirable

• Member of AOTMH
• Member of COTSS - WORK
• Car driver

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.

Certificate of Sponsorship

Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).

From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).

UK Registration

Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).