Hospital at Home lead nurse

An exciting opportunity to work as a Team Lead in the Hospital at Home service (H@H) assessing, planning and instigating treatments within agreed policies and clinical guidelines under the mentorship and supervision of the paediatric consultant in charge of the medical service. We are expanding our service into Camden, South Barnet and Islington.

To develop an innovative and collaborative approach in conjunction with the acute hospital Trust's and primary care teams to provide a comprehensive and seamless service for children with the aim of reducing acute admissions and length of hospital stay for children.

To develop and implement agreed care pathways, protocols and guidelines to care for children in community settings for children referred from the hospital medical teams for children resident in Islington.

The post holder will liaise closely with hospital medical staff, general practitioners, community and hospital nursing teams and the multi-professional team to provide a holistic service responsive to the needs of children and their families.

The post holder will work closely with the CCN team leader, Community Matron and the Acute team to promote the service and ensure high standards of care and patient safety are maintained at all times. The post holder will be responsible for ensuring all nursing staff are trained and competent in assessing, planning implementing and evaluating nursing care and that accurate records are maintained.

Main Duties of the Job

Main duties include professional responsibilities, working according to the NMC code of professional conduct, assessing care and health needs for children and families, maintaining clinical competence within the team, and effective communication across acute and community sites.

Supervising staff is a large part of the role, ensuring training is up to date and developing the service. As we move into another borough, transformation work will take place requiring new pathways and policies.

The team works 8-8pm every day of the year; lone working is an important aspect, ensuring the team's safety at all times.

About Us

Whittington Health serves a richly diverse population and works hard to ensure that all our services are fair and equally accessible to everyone. Nowhere is this more obvious than in the way we look after our staff. We aim to employ a workforce which is as representative as possible of this population, so we are open to the value of differences in age, disability, gender, marital status, pregnancy and maternity, race, sexual orientation, and religion or belief.

Job Responsibilities

We are looking for an experienced, dynamic and motivated leader to join our team. Passion for delivering high quality care, flexibility, excellent communication skills, and inspiration to motivate and lead the team to excellence.

Main Duties

1. Professional Responsibilities
2. To work according to the NMC Code of Professional Conduct and to carry continuing responsibility for reviewing H@H referrals.
3. The assessment of care and health education needs for children and their families.
4. To present and act always in a professional manner, and act as a role model to junior colleagues.
5. To maintain clinical competence, to keep abreast of current trends and to take responsibility for own professional development.
6. To ensure and facilitate effective communication across acute paediatric services in community and hospital settings in Islington and across North central London network.
7. In conjunction with the Line Managers train and supervise nursing staff implementing revised pathways of community care.
8. To work in conjunction with other senior nurses, to develop and implement nursing practices, promoting research and evidence-based practice.
9. To develop close working relationships across primary and secondary care including hospital Trusts Multidisciplinary teams, Community Midwives, Complex and Palliative community nursing teams, Paediatric Emergency Departments, wards and outpatients at Whittington Health and University College London Hospital.

1. Managerial Responsibilities
2. To ensure the service reflects the philosophy of Hospital at Home for children and their families, with consideration of local and national recommendations/individual/ethnic/cultural/social and religious needs.
3. To ensure robust standards and frameworks are in place, in line with current recommendations, to ensure children always receive high quality family centred care.
4. To initiate, develop and implement plans/strategies for improvement of paediatric services in conjunction with the multi-disciplinary teams.
5. To promote close collaboration and cohesive working relationships with General Practitioners, other community health professionals, and the paediatric team, through effective communication channels and a harmonious working environment.
6. To identify and implement necessary changes to meet the needs of children and their families and the service.
7. Ensure effective communication is established with parents, carers and patients that is appropriate and understandable.
8. Participate in and initiate audit, quality initiatives and projects as required to evaluate and develop the acute children's urgent care pathways.
9. Ensure risk management strategies are implemented within area of responsibility and that staff understand and enact the incident reporting procedures.
10. Be proactive in implementing action/learning plans to reduce potential risks or recurrence of adverse incidents.
11. Be proactive in minimising complaints; working closely with senior colleagues seeking to provide local resolution wherever possible.
12. To ensure staff are familiar with national, professional and local quality issues relevant to the delivery of services.
13. Develop and maintain effective communication strategies with primary care and acute unit staff, meeting regularly with the manager to discuss, plan and co-ordinate the service.

1. Clinical Responsibilities
2. Maintain professional accountability at all times, including the assessing planning, delivery and evaluation of care.
3. To be a clinical role model in the field of Ambulatory Paediatrics and practice as an advanced paediatric nurse practitioner ensuring the delivery of high-quality standards of patient care.
4. To develop and implement nursing/multi-professional evidence based, best practice guidelines and policies, for children under the service.
5. To undertake patient assessment, order investigations and initiate treatment where appropriate in accordance with the agreed clinical guidelines, care pathways and protocols as a nurse practitioner.
6. To administer medication within Patient Group Directives and if suitably qualified independently prescribe medications as agreed and documented with clinical supervisor.
7. If qualified prescribe and review medication for therapeutic effectiveness, appropriate to patient needs and in accordance with evidence-based practice, local protocols and within documented scope of practice.
8. If qualified ensure prescribing competence is maintained by continually updating knowledge/skills in practice and annual attendance at prescribing related CPD.
9. If qualified ensure prescribing practice is regularly reviewed via clinical supervision and managerial review meetings.
10. To order and interpret agreed diagnostic tests according to departmental protocols and within local structured guidelines e.g. x-ray, blood, urine and stools laboratory tests.
11. Explore and investigate with the named paediatric consultant, GP and named senior nurse new initiatives for the improvement of service delivery.
12. To establish a partnership approach to involve parents and families as much possible in the development and implementation of H@H services.
13. To work in close collaboration with the General Practitioners, Consultant Paediatricians, the Children's Nurse Consultant Nurses, Nurse Managers and their teams, and the wider multi-professional team to provide high quality care for children and support for families at all times.
14. Maintain nursing records in accordance to NMC guidelines and Local Trusts Policies.
15. To be competent in the use of clinical computerised systems employed in the hospital and community e.g. Care flow/ EPR, Rio, Anglia Ice etc.
16. Act as a source of expertise and advice on safeguarding matters within the Nursing Team, ensuring a high standard of documentation.
17. Develop and maintain an informed awareness of safeguarding children to protect their welfare.
18. Work in close collaboration with practitioners and service managers to ensure effective working practices across all agencies.
19. To undertake other duties and tasks as requested by the Nurse Consultant / Matron.

1. Educational Responsibilities
2. To provide an effective learning environment and appropriate staff development for students and trained staff.
3. Ensure that community and hospital-based staff are educated in new skills and procedures in relation to the Hospital @ home service.
4. Monitor attendance and completion of training and educational courses that staff are allocated to attend.
5. To maintain an accurate database of all training and educational courses completed by team members.
6. To fulfil the role of supervisor where appropriate to learners and junior staff.
7. To promote health and well being to children and their families within outpatient and community settings and utilise opportunities for health education and promotion.
8. To attend training courses as required and extend knowledge and skills in line with service requirements.

1. Quality and Audit Responsibilities
2. To contribute to audit, research, and development programmes within the Directorate in order to promote good practice.
3. Set and monitor measurable standards of care and be accountable for maintaining standards.
4. Develop the audit process for monitoring and reviewing the quality of nursing services provided.
5. Implement changes to the service in order to improve quality of care.
6. Develop and maintain links with others working in Advanced Nurse Practitioner roles across hospital and community posts.

Person Specification

Paediatric Acute Experience

• PICU/ED/Community

3 Years Post Qualifying Experience

• Experience in leading a team

Training

• PILS/APLS
• HDU/Physical Assessment Course

Data/Innovations

• Basic understanding of data and workload pressures
• Experience with transformation work

IV and Central Line Competent

• IV and central line competent
• Teaching/Training Experience

Car Driver

• Looking to work towards driving at work (due to large areas covered)

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.

Matron for children's community nursing teams

£51,883 to £58,544 a year per annum inclusive of HCAs.