Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust

Band 3 Ward Clerk in ITU

This job is now closed

Job summary

The ward administrator is responsible for providing a front-line reception service to the ward and for delivering a high standard of customer care to a wide range of client groups, including the ward's multi-disciplinary team, patients, relatives and their carers.

The post-holder must play a proactive role in collecting, investigating, verifying and recording a high standard of patient demographic and treatment data. The post holder must accurately and in a timely manner enter such information on the computerised patient information system, to ensure that the trust receives the appropriate level of income for patient activity, avoids the potential clinical risks inherent with inaccurate patient records and is compliant with national NHS targets (e.g. on data quality and length of patient wait).

The post-holder must undertake effective forward planning, to ensure that the administrative needs of the service are met and must carry out a range of effective administration processes to support the delivery of high quality patient care.

The ward administrator will not be directly supervised on a day-to-day basis and is responsible for the management and prioritisation of their own workload.

Main duties of the job

To provide a front of house reception service for patients or relatives arriving on the ward/unit, welcoming all visitors and directing as appropriate.

Answering telephones, ensuring bed boards are up to date, transport bookings, to provide weekly and monthly ward activity figures, to provide a confidential and high standard general administrative support to the ward/unit, to ensure that all patient admissions, discharges and attendances are recorded accurately on Cerner or the relevant electronic system in real time, to sort out incoming/outgoing post and distribute or act as necessary and any other ward clerking responsibilities.

About us

This is an exciting time to be working at the Royal Free London NHS Foundation one of the biggest NHS Trusts in the UK, delivering care to more than 1.6 million people a year through our three main hospitals: Barnet, Chase Farm and Royal Free.

The successful candidates are required to be able to demonstrate the Trust values, the responsibilities of the job description and person specification. In particular you should have proven experience of working in a public/patient facing role and have clear and concise verbal and written communication skills. The successful candidates would also need to have the ability to use their initiative and be able to problem solve, in a busy clinical environment.

Date posted

12 December 2023

Pay scheme

Agenda for change

Band

Band 3

Salary

£27,129 to £28,649 a year per annum

Contract

Permanent

Working pattern

Full-time

Reference number

391-RFL-5782688

Job locations

Barnet General Hospital

Wellhouse Lane

Barnet, London

EN5 3DJ

Job description

Job responsibilities

To provide a front of house reception service for patients or relatives arriving on the ward/unit, welcoming all visitors and directing as appropriate.

To answer the telephone and take messages, answer or refer queries as appropriate.

To provide a confidential and high standard general administrative support to the ward/unit, particularly supporting the Ward Manager with tasks such as discharge spread sheets and audit tool completion.

To be responsible for ensuring that all documentation relating to a patients current episode of care, and produced or used on the ward/unit, is accurately filed (according to documented guidelines) and transported to the Health Records department within 2 days of discharge.

To ensure that all patient admissions, discharges and attendances are recorded accurately on Cerner or the relevant electronic system in real time. This includes the registering of births where required in maternity units.

To ensure that the electronic bed board is constantly kept up to date and accurate to reflect the actual activity in the unit, ensuring important data such as predicted dates of discharge are displayed and correct.

To provide weekly and monthly ward activity figures, as required.

To sort out incoming/outgoing post and distribute or act as necessary.

To ensure that pathology and x-ray results are organised and available for review and signing by the clinical team.

To arrange transport internally (via the trusts online portering system) and externally for patients and equipment when the need arises, in line with the trusts transport policy.

To monitor and chase up the completion of inpatient discharge summaries and submit to Clinical Coding within the required timeframes, ensuring that data recorded is of a high quality.

To record in real time whenever a patients care has been transferred to a different consultant or treatment function, paying close attention to accuracy and detail when doing so.

To assist with patient discharge arrangements by organising transport, liaising with other healthcare providers, arranging outpatient appointments and ensuring that relevant paperwork is available, complete and accompanies the patient.

To send a copy of every patients discharge summary to their GP in a timely fashion, in order to facilitate continuity of care once the patient is back in the community.

To liaise with Pharmacy regarding the availability of drugs and arrange for collection when requested.

To assist bereaved relatives by facilitating collection of the death certificate and giving information regarding its collection and ensuring that the medical records of those patients are filed according to documented guidelines.

To assist in the event of a medical emergency/cardiac arrest by making emergency calls as instructed and ensuring that the ward doors are not locked, ward entrance and corridors are free from obstruction and the responding emergency team are directed to where the emergency is.

To provide ad hoc cross-cover, as required, during the absence of ward administrators on other wards.