physical therapy aide London, England
Job description
We are looking for a Band 3 Occupational Therapy (OT) assistant to work within the Trauma and Orthopaedic Occupational Therapy team at Guys and St Thomas’ Hospital.
The Trauma and Orthopaedic OT team across both sites currently comprises of 10 qualified occupational therapists and 3 occupational therapy assistants.
This role is a cross site role, supporting the occupational therapists across the service to provide Occupational Therapy within the hospital setting. Your role will support both clinical and administrative related tasks.
You will be working with adults patients under the guidance of qualified occupational therapists and you will have the opportunity to develop your clinical knowledge and experience with a wide range of conditions.
We are seeking an individual who has excellent communication skills, keen to learn and experience of working with adults in a healthcare setting.
Your role will involve working closely with the occupational therapists in the inpatient service. In addition to supporting clinical practice you will be supporting with administrative tasks and taking the lead in maintaining equipment stores and ordering Equipment.
The successful applicant will need to possess excellent written communication and IT skills, as the role requires liaison with multi-disciplinary team and external services.
Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust comprises five of the UK’s best known hospitals – Guy’s, St Thomas’, Evelina London Children’s Hospital, Royal Brompton and Harefield – as well as community services in Lambeth and Southwark, all with a long history of high quality care, clinical excellence, research and innovation.
We are among the UK’s busiest, most successful foundation trusts. We provide specialist care for patients including heart and lung, cancer and renal services as well as a full range of local hospital and community services for people in Lambeth and Southwark.
We have a long tradition of clinical and scientific achievement and – as part of King’s Health Partners – we are one of England’s eight academic health sciences centres, bringing together world-class clinical services, teaching and research.
We have around 22,700 staff, making us one of the largest NHS Trusts in the country and one of the biggest employers locally. We aim to reflect the diversity of the communities we serve and continue to develop new and existing partnerships with local people, patients, and neighbouring NHS organisations, local authorities and charitable bodies and GPs.
We strive to recruit and retain the best staff as the dedication and skills of our employees lie at the heart of our organisation and ensure that our services are of the highest quality, safe and focused on our patients
Clinical
To carry out and prioritise own caseload of patients with simple predictable conditions as delegated by the therapist
- To provide competent treatment to patients within set clinical protocols as appropriate
- Ability to work with minimal or no immediate supervision – using initiative
- To use own clinical judgement and knowledge in regards to progressing and/or adapting treatment programmes within agreed clinical protocols and parameters
- To assist with the care of patients as appropriate
- To assist the therapist with individual and group treatments/exercise and/or clinics
- To be able to recognise change in the condition or reaction of a patient with guidance from therapists and to watch the patient response to any treatment undertaken.
- To demonstrate an awareness and an ability to manage clinical risk
- To comply with the Health and Safety Regulations
- To be able to cope with occasional, potentially stressful, upsetting or emotional situations in an empathetic manner.
- To attend mandatory annual training
- To maintain stocks of equipment
- Handling of monies as appropriate and required by clinical area
Information resources• Responsible for maintenance of accurate patient records using appropriate/current information systems
Communication
- To be able to motivate and persuade patients through effective communication skills
- Ability to communicate information where there may be barriers to communication and or understanding
- To report regularly to clinical team lead
- To liaise with members of the MDT (multi disciplinary team) with regard to patient care.
- To liase with managers, other administrative and support staff as necessary to ensure the smooth running of the department
- To attend any meetings and seminars/case conferences as appropriate
- To participate in the Performance Review Scheme utilising knowledge and skills framework
- To participate in the assistant and as appropriate, the department education programme.
- To be responsible for personal CPD (continuous personal development)
- To participate in the department’s ongoing audit programme as required.
- To carry out assessments and treatments, with moderate to intense physical effort on a daily basis
- To prioritise workload to manage frequent disruptions by patients, clinical staff, students and administrative support staff
- To sensitively deal with distressing or emotional circumstances regarding patient care such as realistic expectations of rehabilitation outcome
- To support staff when indicated in the management of challenging patients
- To deal with patients with complex mental and physical needs whose condition may lead to anxiety and aggressive behaviour
