Advanced Physiotherapist/Occupational Therapist Hand Practitioner

Job description

Job responsibilities

KEY DUTIES

To work within Trust clinical guidelines, HCPC and professional body guidelines and to have a working knowledge of national and local standards and monitor own and others quality of practice against these.

To work in secondary care in across a variety of hospital settings including trauma assessment unit, ward, hand clinic and outpatients.

To demonstrate as appropriate to role highly developed physical skills for assessment and treatment of patients and construction of splints e.g. dexterity, co-ordination, palpatory and other senses.

To deputise for senior staff as appropriate within the hands service.

The Advanced Clinician will take high level responsibility for the triage, clinical assessment and diagnosis of complex health and wellbeing needs within a defined sphere of practice. They will implement, evaluate, and modify highly complex care/ interventions which they have developed to meet those needs. The Advanced Clinician will provide high level care as specified below for a client group and work across professional disciplines.

With increased experience and training (which will be formally assessed), it is expected that the successful candidate will lead a joint and soft tissue injection clinic. Where suitable; it would be expected that the post holder would work towards independent prescribing for a selected client group. This would form part of the assessment for band 8A transition.

Providing education and training for the MDT as appropriate to role.

CLINICAL & PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITIES

To demonstrate as appropriate to role highly developed physical skills for assessment and treatment of patients e.g., dexterity, co-ordination, palpatory and other senses.

To communicate complex patient and service-related information effectively to Health and Wellbeing and local authority colleagues and third sector agencies as appropriate.

Use complex communication skills and knowledge when working with patients, their families and other provider agencies.

To involve the patient and the family/carers in all relevant discussions about their management and decisions that are made about treatment techniques and facilitating patient involvement in the planning, development, delivery, and evaluation of the service.

To assess capacity, gain valid informed consent and have the ability to work within a legal framework with patients who lack capacity to consent to treatment.

Delivering high level and complex triage, clinical assessment, diagnostics, treatment, and evaluation of the needs within the trust.

Providing leadership; promoting a learning culture for colleagues and other agencies; leading service innovations and demonstrating high level problem solving.

Ensuring excellence in service delivery through personal and service development, underpinned by evidence-based practice and research, embedded in the quality assurance agenda.

Driving innovation; managing the change process to ensure your service continues to be flexible and proactive to reflect the needs of the trust.

To triage patients with complex needs.

To undertake complex clinical assessments of patients/ service users within sphere of advanced practice.

To determine a clinical diagnosis and make high level decisions regarding appropriate treatment/ care plans.

Implement complex care/ interventions according to clinical need.

Evaluate complex care/ interventions based on evidence from clinical outcomes and best practice.

To provide advanced clinical advice, support and training to patients/ service users, families, carers, and professional colleagues to improve their journey and their health and wellbeing.

To be professionally accountable for all aspects of own work including the management of patients in your care.

Registered practitioners who are non-medical prescribers are accountable for their prescribing activities by ensuring they are aware of their Professional accountability and any restrictions or special considerations in their prescribing practice.

To develop and maintain the high-level clinical skills required to work as an advanced practitioner and undertake the necessary training to become an independent prescriber.

ADMINISTRATIVE RESPONSIBILITIES

To maintain accurate, comprehensive, and up to date documentation, in line with legal and departmental requirements, and communicate assessment and treatment results to the appropriate disciplines in the form of reports and letters.

To collect appropriate data and statistics for the use in the review of the service delivery.

To use appropriate information technology skills for communication when required.

TEACHING & TRAINING RESPONSBILITIES

To provide specific, evidence-based training as required to the patient, family, carers, and other members of the multidisciplinary team and other Trusts as appropriate on the clinical and therapeutic management of an individual to support their health and wellbeing. To attend and contribute to local and national conferences and special interest groups within sphere of practice.

To maintain own CPD by keeping abreast of any new trends and developments, and incorporate them as necessary into your work, supporting other staff with their CPD.

LINE MANAGEMENT/SUPERVISORY RESPONSIBILITIES

To demonstrate leadership by means of:

• • Delivering change within sphere of practice, when and where indicated, to improve service delivery.
  • Influencing, motivating, supporting, and enabling others to contribute towards the effectiveness and success of the trust

To provide high level advice and guidance in working with colleagues locally to ensure best practice across all disciplines in the assessment, treatment and long-term management of patients/ service users within sphere of practice.

To identify innovations and lead the implementation of new working practices in conjunction with patients/ service users, health, wellbeing, local authority and third sector partners.

To take responsibility for their own high level and complex decision making and the decisions of their team which effect service delivery.

CLINICAL GOVERNANCE, RESEARCH & AUDIT

Develop strategies and protocols within the service to assist with interdisciplinary professional working.

To benchmark current service delivery against local and national clinical guidelines and standards of care.

To lead on current best practice, based on the bench marking outcomes.

To translate local and national guidelines and train staff to ensure they have the skills and knowledge required to deliver effective services.

To measure and evaluate own work and current team practices through the use of evidence-based projects, audit, research, statistical information and outcome measures and lead others in doing so.

To promote audit and research within the hand therapy and hand trauma units to enhance clinical practice and ensure quality of care.

To network with practitioner colleagues within the trust and across the North West and Nationally, to learn together and share good practice.

To interpret and implement quality assurance practices within own work situation.

Registered Practitioners are required to evidence maintenance of their registration with the relevant regulatory body and work to their Code of Professional Conduct.

Person Specification

Qualifications

Essential

• Degree in Physiotherapy / Occupational Therapy or equivalent qualification.
• Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) registration
• Postgraduate training/CPD for the development of clinical skills with a focus on hand therapy BAHT level 2
• Advanced Clinical Practice Qualification - Hand Therapy or equivalent MSc or willingness to undertake this study

Desirable

• Postgraduate training or equivalent experience for the development in Management and Leadership skills
• Membership of BAHT
• Completion of injection course
• Completion of prescriber course

Knowledge and Experience

Essential

• Significant experience of working for a UK Healthcare setting
• Significant experience in Hand Therapy
• Postgraduate experience in hand therapy management including plastics, trauma, surgery, splinting and casting.
• Advanced knowledge and experience in a wide range of approaches to the management of patients with a wide variety of complex hand conditions
• Active involvement in clinical audit, governance, research and policy guideline implementation
• Experience of teaching to unidisciplinary/ multidisciplinary groups
• Previous experience student supervision / clinical education

Skills

Essential

• Excellent communication skills both written and verbal.
• A commitment to professional development of self and others

Desirable

• Skills in critical analysis and the application of research to practice

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).

Employer details

Employer name

Mersey and West Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust

Address

Whiston

Whiston

L35 5DR

Employer's website

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