Theatre Nurse/Theatre Practitioner (Scrub)

Theatre Nurse/Theatre Practitioner (Scrub)

FULL TIME, PART TIME AND BANK HOURS AVAILABLE

As a Theatre Nurse (RN) / Theatre Practitioner (ODP) with Independent Health Group, your primary focus will be delivering safe, high-quality care to patients throughout their perioperative journey. You will play an active part in organising and delivering patient care within the Operating Theatre, fostering a collaborative and supportive environment with the multi-disciplinary team across the department and Independent Health Group. We’re looking for someone who can promote best practices within their scope but who is aligned with our values. You’ll put patients at the heart of everything you do, ensuring that patient safety and excellent clinical outcomes remain top priorities. In every interaction, you’ll treat patients with the utmost respect, dignity, empathy, honesty, and compassion.

Main Duties of the Job

In this role, you will also play an essential part in supporting Independent Health Group's commitment to Patients Always Come First. We strive to ensure that patients see the same surgeon throughout their treatment journey to ensure continuity of care, with accessible and responsive staff members to meet their needs. You’ll be a key contributor to this commitment by fostering an environment of openness and patient-centred care within the Operating Theatre.

Excellence through continuous improvement is a cornerstone of our practice. You’ll have opportunities to engage in service improvement initiatives, aiming for better patient outcomes, improved efficiency, and stronger communication. Independent Health Group invests in its people, and you’ll be encouraged to pursue your own professional development to reach excellence in patient care.

Teamwork underpins everything we do, and high-quality patient care depends on effective collaboration and communication. In this role, you’ll actively contribute to collective leadership, being supportive, respectful, valuing your colleagues and working together to deliver outstanding care. A role model to ensure effective two-way communication, both within your team, the extended Independent Health Group family and with wider external stakeholders. This is essential to our mission, and you’ll play a pivotal role in upholding this commitment.

About Us

We were set up in 2004 by Dr Matthew Wordsworth with the aim of offering patients the choice of being treated out of hospital, closer to home. Matt wanted to create a new health care organisation in which like-minded health care professionals could deliver truly patient-centred care.

In the summer of 2022 we have proven this, with our Outstanding CQC rating!

Since 2004 we have grown the range of services we offer, and the sites we work from, but we still believe that Independent Health Group offers you an opportunity to make a real difference to patients' care and treatment.

We pride ourselves on the quality of care we offer our patients. All the work we undertake is for the NHS.

Job Responsibilities

Clinical Care

Delivering Patient Care: Provide high-quality care throughout the perioperative process, adhering to Independent Health Group policies and procedures.

Theatre List Coordination: Support efficient theatre list coordination, ensuring timely start and finish times to optimise workflow.

Circulating Duties: Be proficient in circulating duties to effectively support Healthcare Assistants (HCAs) undertaking this role, ensuring smooth workflow and patient care.

Equipment and Theatre Preparation: Ensure all required equipment and theatre preparations are completed in advance to prevent delays or cancellations. Additionally, plan ahead by ensuring equipment and sundries are stocked and available for subsequent lists, supporting efficient forward planning.

Theatre Suite Hygiene: Maintain a clean and safe surgical environment, adhering to all relevant hygiene protocols, including daily, weekly, and monthly cleaning schedules.

Effective Communication: Provide support and reassurance to patients during local anaesthetic procedures, ensuring proper positioning, advocacy, and post-operative care advice.

Record-Keeping: Maintain accurate, timely, and reflective clinical records in both paper and digital formats via the Patient Administration System. Engage with new systems and processes as they are implemented.

Upholding Patient Safety Standards: Adhere to WHO surgical safety guidelines and promote a culture of speaking up for safety. Utilise the "Stop the Line" tool to immediately address concerns to ensure patient safety issues are acknowledged, work is safely paused, and corrective action is taken collaboratively:

1. Say WHAT you see,
2. Say WHAT you are concerned about,
3. Say WHAT you want to happen next.

Quality Improvement and Audits: Engage in quality improvement initiatives, contribute to audits, report incidents, and support resource management to enhance patient safety.

Resuscitation Competency: Maintain up-to-date competence in emergency resuscitation techniques, specifically at the Immediate Life Support (ILS) level.

Waste Management and Infection Prevention & Control (IPC): Ensure safe waste disposal and strict adherence to IPC measures, following Aseptic Non-Touch Technique (ANTT) best practices.

Escalation Protocols: Use NEWS2 scoring to detect early signs of patient deterioration, escalating concerns appropriately through line management and incident reporting systems.

Health and Safety: Uphold workplace safety standards, including safe sharps management, fire safety, and overall risk mitigation for patients, colleagues, and yourself. This includes being aware of any business continuity and emergency planning protocols.

Promoting a Culture of Safety: Follow established safety protocols to maintain high standards of care in alignment with the Patient Safety Incident Response Framework (PSIRF).

Incident Reporting and Investigations: Ensure timely incident reporting and actively contribute to patient safety investigations using the Systems Engineering Initiative for Patient Safety (SEIPS) methodology, helping identify lessons learned and integrating improvements into practice.

Ongoing Professional Development

• Ensure Competence & Self-Directed Learning: Identify personal learning and professional development needs, proactively seeking growth opportunities. Serve as a versatile Theatre Practitioner across areas such as scrub, admit, discharge, and recovery.

Professional Knowledge and Competence: Keep abreast of professional best practices, research developments, and maintain your professional registration.

Safeguarding

Safeguarding Children: Everyone working for IHG regardless of the work they do has a statutory duty to safeguard and promote the welfare of children. When children and/or their carers use our services, it is essential that all child protection concerns are both recognised and acted on appropriately. You have a responsibility to ensure you are familiar with and follow the child protection policies and procedures. To ensure you are equipped to carry out your duties effectively, you must also undertake mandatory child protection training and updates at the competency level appropriate to the work you do.

Safeguarding Adults: Everyone working for IHG regardless of the work they do has a duty to safeguard and promote the welfare of vulnerable adults. When patients and/or their carers use our services, it is essential that all protection concerns are both recognised and acted on appropriately. You have a responsibility to ensure you are familiar with and follow IHG policies in relation to safeguarding vulnerable adults. To ensure you are equipped to carry out your duties effectively, you must also undertake mandatory vulnerable adult protection training and updates at the competency level appropriate to the work you do.

Note:

This job description is not intended to be either prescriptive or exhaustive but aims to give an overview of the level of responsibility, the activities and the attributes required of the role. The services provided by IHG are developing and expanding rapidly, and a degree of flexibility, change and development is expected in all roles.

Person Specification

• Friendly, supportive, and reassuring
• Accountability for safe patient care
• Collaborative and improvement-focused

Experience

• Multi-disciplinary healthcare team experience
• Scrub-trained for day cases
• Governance and risk management experience
• Quality improvement involvement

Qualifications

• Degree in relevant field or equivalent
• Registered Nurse (NMC) or ODP (HCPC)
• Evidence of ongoing professional development
• Immediate Life Support (ILS) certification

Knowledge & Skills

• Understanding of high-quality clinical care
• Effective communication with diverse patients
• Clear written and verbal skills
• Ability to give/receive feedback
• Teamwork in a multi-disciplinary setting
• Familiar with electronic patient records
• Willing to develop scrub skills
• Knowledge of WHO protocols and NEWS2 scoring
• Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) knowledge

Additional Requirements

• Flexibility to travel between sites as required

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.

£42,619 to £44,751 a year Plus 5% Annual Discretionary Bonus