Retrieval Team Leader

Job summary

£31,049 - £37,796 per annum (in accordance with 25/26 pay scales anticipated to be effective as from August 2025 + HCAS where applicable )

The National Health Service Blood and Transplant Tissue and Eye Services are an integral part of the NHS. Our tissue donation programme saves and radically improves thousands of lives every year.

This is a unique opportunity to join one of our retrieval teams with services capable of retrieving tissues such as eyes, skin, bone, tendons and hearts. With your help, well safely and efficiently collect and store tissues, comply with regulations, and make the most of these valuable gifts.

NHS Blood and Transplant offer a dynamic and friendly working environment where teamwork is highly valued. Personal development is also considered a priority and is supported through extensive training and development opportunities open to all employees.

Our retrieval teams cover a 7-day scheduled rota with a range of shifts covering between the hours of 08.00 21.00. If you are able to work within this, wed like to hear from you!

Main duties of the job

In this role, you will retrieve tissue from deceased donors, ensuring high safety and quality standards, and supporting surgical donation programmes to meet targets. Key duties include:

• Supporting the Living Tissue Donation Specialist in the operational activity of the surgical donation programmes.
• Communicate, within NHSBT and wider NHS, to provide and receive complex and/or sensitive information verbally, by telephone, fax, or face-to-face. Clear and accurate communication and feedback are essential. This can be in conflict to your other priorities.
• Training and mentoring new and less experienced colleagues.
• Supervising the work of a small team when undertaking tissue retrieval from deceased donors in house or out in hospitals/hospices/funeral homes etc.
• Liaise with a range of hospital staff including mortuary staff and hospital site managers to co-ordinate retrievals and access to suitable retrieval facilities. At weekends or at night this negotiation can be more complex.
• Ensuring efficient working and productivity whilst maintaining accurate reports of activities performed.
• Lifting and carrying items of up to 15kg, with and without the use of mechanical aids.
• Facilitating deceased tissue donations and visiting surgical donation programme sites within and outside of contracted working hours.

You must be available to travel, work irregular hours (including nights, weekends, and holidays), and participate in a shift rota as required, with advance notice.

About us

It takes all types of people to deliver the kind of service that saves and improves lives. At NHS Blood and Transplant, youll join a team of more than 6,000 people who are making a genuine difference to communities, families, friends, relatives and more across the UK. We play a unique and special role in the NHS by helping people do something extraordinary- donate blood, blood products, organs, tissues, or stem cells to save someone in need.

Our three core values are what set us apart. They guide and inspire everything we do. By being caring, expertly meeting the needs of our patients and our people, and accepting nothing less than the best quality, we can do extraordinary work and help our people to do something extraordinary in their career, too. Three small words, one big difference - Caring, Expert and Quality. Together we'll save and improve more lives than ever.

You will join us on our journey to create an inclusive workplace and aim to reflect the diverse communities we work with, and we positively encourage applications from all sectors of the community.