Senior Wheelchair Therapist

Job description

Job responsibilities

Job Purpose:

We are seeking an inspirational, motivated, and proactive clinician to support in the maintenance and development of a high-quality wheelchair service for the population of Runcorn, Widnes, and St Helens.

The successful candidate will work as a senior clinician, assessing for and prescribing wheelchairs and specialist seating solutions taking a lead role in the advanced and specialist assessment and treatment of clients who have complex, progressive and/or chronic presentations. The Halton-based service covers a wide age range, from 30 months (andyounger in special circumstances) upwards, so a broad knowledge of medical conditions and associated physical, sensory, learning disabilities, psychological and mental health issues is essential.

Duties and Responsibilities:

1. Provide care, advice and guidance in the treatment of others, when dealing with complex highly specialist conditions.

2. Responsible for the delivery of identified specialist training.

3. Work in partnership with the other services/stakeholder partnership agencies to enable patients/clients to be treated in the appropriate setting.

4. Ensure that the team provides a high-quality service to its patients/clients by providing caseload and clinical supervision.

5. Ensure that teams work proactively in order to deliver anticipatory and maintenance care, providing a responsive service to patients with both planned and unplanned care needs.

6. Develop partnerships and joint working with service users and stakeholders to improve patient/client care.

7. Work in partnership with other organisations to support the effective and co-ordinated provision of health and social care services.

8. Participate in the development of caseload management across the local health economy.

9. Provide leadership and mentoring to those staff developing into a caseload management role.

10. Challenge professional and organisational boundaries to ensure that the role is focused on meeting the needs of service users.

11. Act as an advocate and champion for patients/clients in a variety of forums and professional groups and challenge attitudes and behaviour.

12. Act as a role model to others ensuring that patients receive the most effective care possible.

13. Contribute to the development of policy and services to reflect the needs of the target population.

14. Practice autonomously and demonstrate evidence based clinical decision making.

15. Provide clinical expertise and knowledge to others when managing complex and highly complex situations.

16. Assess patient conditions and consider a range of options when delivering complex and highly complex care, drawing on specialist services as required.

17. Undertake chronic disease management reviews of the housebound patient/client, where appropriate.

18. Provide support in managing patients/clients with chronic diseases.

19. Following holistic assessment of need, develop individualised care plans to fulfil those needs, with the involvement of patients and carers.

20. Implement and evaluate care delivery for patients/clients with identified needs.

21. Direct and support the management of complex and highly complex, continuing care packages.

22. Ensure that all clinical activity provided by the team directly reflects the core objectives of health promotion, supported self-care, disease specific management, management of long-term conditions and end of life/palliative care.

23. Set objectives, by which performance will be monitored.

24. Work with the Service Lead to deliver local based services, by participating in meetings and communicating the outcomes to others.

25. Provide reports to the service lead on activity as requested.

26. Actively participate in policy and service development authoring protocols as required.

27. Undertake clinical/service improvement audits.

28. The post holder will utilise data and data tools (including databases) to produce appropriate monitoring reports on both patient care and service outcomes and produce appropriate communication for patients.

29. Communicate at all levels of the organisation to a variety of health and social care professionals to provide best outcomes for patients/clients.

30. Maintain up to date knowledge and competence in line with professional and service requirements and demonstrate critical thinking, decision-making and reflective skills to ensure own professional development.

1. Create an environment in which learning and practice development is fostered, evaluated and disseminated.

2. Facilitate effective learning within the area of practice for all students and practitioners.

3. Provide support to team members holding responsibility for mentoring students.

4. Undertake the training and development of other clinicians.

5. Monitor and maintain standards of patient/client care delivery. Including maintaining and monitoring of clinical competency and standards of record keeping.

6. In conjunction with the service lead, ensure systems are in place for the ongoing review and assessment of care provision and delivery.

7. Deliver clinical training and supported experience, identified via Personal Development Plan (PDP) and Knowledge and Skills Framework (KSF).

8. Work within guidelines to identify and manage risk, reporting identified risks to the service lead.

9. Report any incidents as per Trust policies and support or undertake any investigations as delegated by the service lead.

10. Monitor and ensure that the quality of the patient care delivered by those to whom training is provided is evidenced based and supported by best practice, through the use of audit, caseload and clinical supervision.

11. Participate in patient satisfaction reporting to improve patient care.

12. The post holder shall as necessary provide cover for and undertake duties of absent colleagues.

13. The post holder shall follow all the policies and procedures of the organisation.

Person Specification

Qualifications

Essential

• Degree, or equivalent,
• Relevant work based experience.
• Registration with relevant professional body.
• Appropriate prescriber.
• Post registration qualification, or demonstrable equivalent experience.

Desirable

• Evidence of CPD/short courses.

Relationships

Essential

• If you are related to a director, or have a relationship with a director or employee of an appointing organisation, please state the relationship

Skills & Knowledge

Essential

• Awareness of current national and local agenda in health and social care.
• Evidence of being able to communicate complex, sensitive information and advice on healthcare to patients / carers / colleagues.
• Understanding of multi-agency working.
• Ability to network with multidisciplinary colleagues.
• Awareness of factors that contribute to good health and the importance of promoting these in line with organisational public health policy.
• IT literate.
• Ability to work under pressure and manage a diverse workload.
• Excellent communication, organisational and interpersonal skills
• Risk assessment skills.
• Ability to understand and analyse complex data.
• Self-management and motivation skills.
• Confidence to challenge poor practice and ability to address difficult issues.
• Report writing skills.

Job Specific Requirements

Essential

• The ability to travel independently across the Trust
• The ability to work flexibly in accordance with service needs

Experience

Essential

• Experience of management and clinical leadership.
• Experience of successful multi-agency working.

Desirable

• Experience in the chosen field of practice

Sponsorship

Essential

• Do you have the right to stay and work in the UK without sponsorship (share-codes will be checked if applicable)

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

Bridgewater Community Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust

Address

Halton Independent Living Centre

Collier Street

Runcorn

Cheshire

WA7 1HB

Employer's website

http://bridgewater.nhs.uk/ (Opens in a new tab)