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Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust
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About
Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust (SCFT) is the largest community health and care provider in Sussex. Our expert teams deliver a wide range of medical, nursing and therapeutic care to over 10,000 people a day, serving a total population of 1.3 million.
We pride ourselves in providing excellent care at the heart of the community. In July 2018, the Care Quality Commission (CQC) gave us an improved ‘Good’ rating, with ‘Outstanding’ features. 96% of our patients said they would recommend our services to their friends and family, and we attribute this to the hard work and dedication of each and every one of our teams.
We offer our staff a multitude of benefits; flexible working, free health and wellbeing checks, three tax efficient workplace nurseries rated ‘Good’ and ‘Outstanding’ by Ofsted, and a wide range of exciting learning and development opportunities including apprenticeships, rotations, and external courses and conferences.
Contact
If you have any queries, or require support with your application, please contact our friendly Recruitment team:Telephone: 01273 242227
Email: [email protected]
Medical Secretary
Accepting applications until: 01-Sep-2024 23:59
Vacancy status: Open
Accepting applications until: 01-Sep-2024 23:59
Key details
Location
- Site
- Moulsecoomb Health Centre
- Address
- Hodshrove Lane
- Town
- Brighton
- Postcode
- BN2 4SE
- Major / Minor Region
- East Sussex
Contract type & working pattern
- Contract
- Permanent
- Hours
- Part time - 20 hours per week (Across working week Monday to Friday preferable)
Salary
- Salary
- £25,147 - £27,596 Per annum/pro rata
- Salary period
- Yearly
- Grade
- (Band 4)
Specialty
- Main area
- Diabetes administration and secretarial team
Job overview
We require a skilled, supportive and efficient Medical Secretary to join our friendly, but busy multi-disciplinary Diabetes Care for You service that supports patients living with diabetes across Brighton and Hove and High Weald, Lewes and Havens.
Working as a small team of medical secretaries, you will provide an effective secretarial service for our Diabetes Consultants and doctors on rotation, in order to deliver an excellent service for our patients. You must have good organisational and communication skills, be able to work under pressure and on your own initiative and follow directions. You must be able to solve problems and be engaged in service development for both the administrative and clinical processes to maximise efficiencies and ensure an excellent patient experience.
The community diabetes service is a multi-disciplinary team that includes Consultants, Diabetes Specialist Nurses, Dietitians, Podiatrists and Psychotherapists along with administrative and operational teams. Our aim is to help to improve health outcomes for people living with diabetes, and will meet the needs of the growing diabetes population across Brighton and Hove, and High Weald, Lewes and the Havens, both by providing interventions to people with diabetes and increasing the level of skills and knowledge within primary care.
Advert
Working alongside another medical secretary you will provide a comprehensive secretarial / personal assistant role to the Consultants and Doctors on rotation. This includes audio typing letters, referrals, reports etc, working to deadlines in order to support our patients.
The ability to organise and prioritise work effectively is essential as is the ability to accurately and quickly touch-type. Experience of audio typing, computer skills and medical terminology is required although previous work experience as a medical secretary is not essential for the right person. You will have an excellent telephone manner and able to prioritise competing demands, meeting deadlines throughout the week.
The goal of the service is to enable patients to access education, information, advice and support to enable them to make informed choices about how to manage their condition, so that they can stay as well as possible for as long as possible and reduce their risk of diabetes related complications. Joint care planning and goal setting is a focus of our delivery model with patients in control and empowered to self-manage.
Working for our organisation
We are the main provider of NHS community services across East and West Sussex. Our 6,000 staff serve a population of 1.3 million providing essential medical, nursing, and therapeutic care to adults and children.
Our Trust vision is to provide excellent care at the heart of the community, helping people plan, manage, adapt to changes in their health, supporting avoidable hospital admissions and reducing hospital stay times.
We have opportunities for everyone across our wide variety of services including medical, clinical, support and corporate services.
Why work for us?
- Positive 2023 NHS Staff Survey results, scoring highly in compassionate culture & leadership, and staff wellbeing support
- Variety of working environments across the community, in patients' homes, within our community hospitals and bases across the county
- Supportive flexible working patterns such as: part time, flexi time, annualised hours, and flexi retirement options
- Excellent training and development opportunities
- Research opportunities
- Cost-effective workplace nurseries in Crawley, Hove and Brighton
- Thriving BAME, Disability and Wellbeing, LGBT+ and Religion and Belief staff networks
- Level 3 accredited Disability Confident Leader, committed to creating inclusive workplaces
- Veteran Aware Trust, achieving accreditation from Veterans Covenant Healthcare Alliance (VCHA)
- Located in stunning Sussex, with easy access to the South Downs and the coast
- Access to a wide range of benefits and discounts for NHS staff
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
1. Job overview
a) To provide a comprehensive and effective medical secretarial personal assistant administrative service to medical consultants within Diabetes Care For you, in order to facilitate good health care to patients. The work is confidential, can at times be challenging and complex, requiring compassion, tact, diplomacy and understanding when undertaking all channels of communication with patients, their families and other professionals.
b) Work within a small medical secretary team providing duties which include audio typing medical letters and reports within required time scales with accuracy. To ensure quality and content of data held on spread sheets is accurate and up to date. Manage, develop and initiate systems and procedures within the scope of the medical secretarial team and ensure compliance.
c) To undertake general office duties, including diary management and personal assistant support for the Consultant team, emailing, updating computer systems and ordering of stationery and clinical equipment/medical devices, being alert to financial restraints. Providing training and support to other administrative staff as required.
2. Communication and working relationships
a) Daily liaison with medical team and administrative colleagues within DCFY. Regular contact with other clinicians within the wider multi-disciplinary team (MDT) and those in partner organisations including GP surgeries, secondary care and local authorities. Exchange information with patients and their families on a variety of matters and procedures as required. Maintain effective working relationships within the small medical secretarial team within DCFY.
b) Undertake telephone calls and email correspondence, both external and internal, including sensitive communications in liaison with internal and external professionals, patients, and their carers and other agencies. Liaise with patients regarding appointments as required, exercise judgement and manage expectations when collaborating to support the needs and journey of the patient. Provides reassurance and advice to callers and passes on medical advice as asked to by the Consultants. Process orders when required using NHS ordering system and adhering to procurement processes.
c) The post holder is required to communicate complex confidential information regularly which may involve explaining complicated administrative processes. Communicates sensitive, contentious information requiring persuasion or negotiation as required. Provides reassurance and advice to callers and passes on medical advice as directed by the Consultants and clinical teams. Analyses information to resolve problems for patients, carers and staff, e.g. on appointments, diary commitments. Communicate with people on day-to-day matters in a form appropriate to then and to the situation.
d) Support the preparation of group materials if required, including the preparation of power point slides, literature handbooks and patient leaflets.
3. Main tasks
a) Audio-typing of clinics held by the Diabetes Consultants and Doctors on specialist rotation, including medical reports, referral letters and correspondence using medical terminology and confidential medical information. To compose letters as appropriate or directed. Type medical correspondence, documents, forms as required from audio or digital tape. Ensure timely dispatch of this correspondence. Proof-read, format and finish correspondence and medical reports that are visually attractive and have high standard of readability using Microsoft Office software
b) Assist in maintaining appointment systems, considering where improvements can be made. Takes initiative to prioritise appointments and commitments where possible or referring to the diary holder where necessary. Ensure all diary entries include accurate details of appointment with time and venue
c) Under direction of Consultants or line manager organise meetings, training events etc. ensuring venues, equipment and refreshments are available; prepare agendas, quality check papers and to ensure these are disseminated in accordance with required timescales
d) Use various web-based systems including dictations software, Microsoft office suite and SystmOne to support reporting for service delivery such as 18-week report.
e) Manage Medical Secretary generic mailbox to liaise with colleagues in the service, external stakeholders and healthcare professionals to obtain results, updates and reports for patients and ensure incoming clinical correspondence is dealt with quickly.
f) Undertake general office duties including electronic filing, photocopying, post etc. Process orders when required to, using NHS ordering systems and adhering to procurement processes.
g) Regularly review and communicate administrative procedures by attending staff meetings and through group email briefings. Makes judgements and advises others on compliance with procedures where there is any ambiguity.
4. Main responsibilities
a) Act as the first point of contact for the Diabetes Consultants, providing a comprehensive and efficient personal assistant/medical secretarial service.
b) Responsible for ensuring incoming clinical correspondence is dealt with quickly, ensuring anything urgent is brought to the Consultants’ attention. To work with other agencies to obtain results as necessary.
c) Ensure urgent letters are typed first. Maintain concentration in order to check the quality of own work even when experiencing interruptions.
d) Take and transcribe formal and informal minutes as required utilising technology where it is efficient to do so, eg MS Teams recordings and translations.
e) To provide guidance to other secretarial staff within DCFY service.
f) Responsible for managing own workload, maintaining the quality of own work. Working independently and to provide cover for other members of the secretarial team as required.
g) To assist with the recruitment and selection process of administrative and secretarial staff, ensuring all relevant personnel documentation is completed as required. To be part of the shortlisting process and interview panel for the recruitment of staff. To attend necessary training to support this work.
At the heart of how we operate is our Trust values:
- Compassionate Care
- Working Together,
- Achieving Ambitions
- Delivering Excellence
Our values are fundamental to the high-quality care we provide to the people who need us. We are proud to be a community that cares, delivering our services as a team whilst supporting our employees as individuals.
We are committed to being an inclusive employer that actively promotes equality and challenges discrimination. We embrace and celebrate diversity, encouraging applications from individuals of all backgrounds. We particularly welcome applications from candidates with an ethnically diverse heritage, those with disabilities, and individuals identifying as part of the LGBTQIA+ community. Our aim is to grow a workforce that reflects the diversity of the communities we serve.
We strive to create an environment where every individual is valued and respected. Our recruitment process is designed to support candidates who require reasonable adjustments and to accommodate the needs of applicants.
This post may close earlier than the published closing date if sufficient applications are received.
Correspondence relating to this vacancy will be conducted electronically, please ensure you check your emails, including your junk folder. If you have not heard from us within two weeks please assume your application has been unsuccessful on this occasion.
Applicant requirements
The postholder will have access to vulnerable people in the course of their normal duties and as such this post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service to check for any previous criminal convictions.
Person specification
Qualifications & training
Essential criteria
- Educated to GCSE level or equivalent in Maths and English language, or able to demonstrate equivalent competence
- Good level of secretarial skills RSA Level 3 (accurate and efficient), or can demonstrate equivalent knowledge through experience
- Audio typing skills, or digital audio typing
- Good knowledge of medical terminology (AMSPAR or medical terminology course)
Desirable criteria
- Computer related certificate or equivalent e.g. ECDL
- Minute taking and transcribing training
- Shorthand or speed writing skills
Experience
Essential criteria
- Significant administrative experience
- Experience of arranging appointments, meetings and events, including co-ordinating diaries
Desirable criteria
- Stock control and ordering supplies
- Development or contributing to the development of administrative office procedures
Skills and Knowledge
Essential criteria
- Knowledge of secretarial and administrative procedures and systems, acquired through training and experience
- Ability to work effectively in a team and independently
- Advanced skills in using Microsoft Office software – diary, email, tasks, excel
- Able to carry out basic calculations using Microsoft Excel
- Fast and accurate keyboard skills
- Ability to co-ordinate tasks and assess independently for priority and meet deadlines
Other requirements
Essential criteria
- Ability to work flexibly
- There may be some requirement to travel to other trust sites to attend meetings
Further details / informal visits contact
- Name
- Charlotte Plant
- Job title
- Operational Support Officer
- Email address
- [email protected]
- Telephone number
- 07484 404039
- Additional information
Kim Preece
Operational Lead
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