Specialist Nurse in Stroud

To manage the Hospice at Home caseload both in the office and in the patients' home with assessments, reassessments and liaising with external partners and multi-disciplinary teams. Accepting and processing referrals, ensuring appropriate and timely services are delivered.

Providing leadership, support and guidance, and working with HH administrators and HH care staff to ensure the provision of high quality end of life care in patients' homes. Preventing unnecessary admission to acute sector or residential care settings and enabling patients to be cared for and to die at home. Working on a rota basis to provide cover 7 days per week between the hours of 07:00 and 22:00. Providing support to the Hospice and Home Manager and Director of Care to develop and innovate the service, with delegated operational responsibility in the absence of the Head of Hospice at Home.

Main duties and responsibilities

• Line Management
  • Responsible for the recruitment, induction and probation of new HCAs and RNs.
  • To Line Manage HCAs and RNs and manage employee relations issues, liaising with HR where appropriate.
  • To undertake regular performance reviews with the HCAs and accompany them on visits to ensure performance standards are maintained.
• Clinical
  • To work directly with HH team members in the community setting, monitoring standards and performance and assessing competency.
  • To work towards achieving the local hospice and the National NHSE career pathway, core capabilities in practice and education framework competencies.
  • To support the service with any additional clinical skills required to develop the service and provide a high standard of timely patient care.
  • To provide clinical advice and support to the Administrators in the planning and booking of care, ensuring a match of clinical needs with appropriate HH staff.
  • To liaise and communicate effectively with patients and carers, to be confident in dealing with challenging or distressing situations.
  • To liaise with GPs, District Nurses, Hospital teams, Continuing Healthcare and other providers to support the provision of high quality care.
  • To act as a clinical resource, planning, implementing and evaluating End of Life nursing care delivered to patients in their own homes.
  • Providing emotional support for family and carers and referring to Living Well if required.
  • Participate in weekly meetings with the CNS team and monthly meetings with Living Well Administration.
  • To work with Administrators to support the rostering of staff and allocation of care based on clinical need.
  • To ensure effective communication between members of the HH team and other health and social care providers so that patient care is coordinated and seamless.
  • To maintain accurate electronic records regarding all aspects of service provision including patient records and staff documentation.
• Governance
  • To contribute to the production of policies, guidelines and protocols to ensure improvements in the quality of patient care, are safe, clinically effective and based on best practice evidence.
  • To support the governance structures within hospice at home, including the development and assessment of competencies, outcome measures, audits and surveys.
  • To support data collection to analyse service delivery including capacity and demand.
  • To support the timely reporting of incidents ensuring an appropriate review, documenting learning and actions.
  • To ensure risks are minimised through identifying any potential risks and ensuring that policies and health and safety practices are adhered to.
  • Contribute to the setting and monitoring of standards including proposing actions required to improve the quality of services.
  • Monitoring the standards of care and professional practice delivered to HH patients and their carers, through a structured governance and assurance framework.
• Education and Training
  • To support the mentoring process for new staff ensuring that they have attained relevant skills and competency during their induction and probationary period.
  • To be responsible for your own clinical knowledge and ensure it is up to date with current guidelines and evidence based practice.
  • To support the acquisition and development of skills of the HH nursing team through close working relationships providing support, education and supervision.
  • To attend internal and external meetings and conferences, where necessary.
  • To actively promote the use of End of Life Care Initiatives by raising awareness among health care staff about the needs of clients and their families and carers.
  • To participate and contribute to any external or internal education both formally and informally within competence boundaries.
• Professional
  • To maintain confidentiality of information about patients, staff and other hospice business at all times and to abide by The NMC Code.
  • To attend network/multidisciplinary team/Primary and Secondary Care meetings as requested, to represent hospice community services and disseminate and cascade information.
  • To demonstrate a proactive, creative and problem solving approach to the planning and organisation of the service in conjunction with the Hospice at Home Manager.
  • To work closely with the wider hospice team to ensure that there is excellent communication between the teams with regard to support and care of patients in the community.
  • To participate in the recruitment, selection, supervision and induction of new staff.
  • To carry out regular appraisals for staff that are within your line management.