General Practitioner with Enhanced Role in Frailty

Join West Kent Primary Care and become a vital member of our Frailty team as a General Practitioner with a Special Interest. We are looking for a GP who has a passion to care and pro-actively support patients with frailty. The GP must be willing to commit to two sessions on a Tuesday. This role offers a distinctive opportunity to work as an independent practitioner and join a dynamic and committed primary care team, delivering high quality, friendly patient services to our community. You will foster a culture of excellence and knowledge sharing to ensure the highest level of care for our patients.

Main duties of the job

This post has been created to support and develop proactive services within Frailty and Complex Care in West Kent. Though this covers a broad description of the expected roles, the appointee will play a pivotal role in shaping the finer details to optimise service delivery. A key element of the frailty GP role will be to support the MDT in assessment of these high-risk patients in the community. This will involve participation in MDT meetings, reviewing clinical records and medication, identifying polypharmacy and the assessment of patients at home with the support of consultant geriatricians from the acute and community trusts. Frailty GPs will provide support to the MDT in proactive reviews where required, but also in the assessment and follow up of patients referred by West Kent Home Visiting team, Home Treatment Service and Acute Frailty Units. The Frailty GP role will provide an excellent opportunity for professional development in this field, with view to accreditation. In addition, frailty GPs will support in the training and development of frailty focused staff and teams. Where possible GPs will perform joint assessments with clinical staff in training such as advanced nurse practitioners, paramedic practitioners, clinical pharmacists and physician associates.

About us

West Kent Primary Care is an innovative GP Federation whose shareholders include all 50 practices in West Kent, covering nearly 500,000 patients. Within this, the practices are divided into 10 Primary Care Networks (PCN). We are made up of a core operations team, a PCN based workforce made up of clinical and non‑clinical staff and a Board of Executive Directors consisting of four local GPs and twelve PCN clinical directors. The federation also offers a variety of services including, but not limited to, the Community Diabetes Service, Post Covid Assessment Service and a Frailty Service.

Job responsibilities

• Provide clinical care using expert knowledge and developed clinical skills to ensure that the quality of patient care is maintained at the highest standard.
• To provide a high standard of care to any patient for whom you have clinical responsibility. This will include any patients referred to you and cared for by you personally or by members of your team and, in addition, any patients of your consultant colleagues whom you are covering.
• To participate in clinical and other service activities and developments with the aim of ensuring a high standard of patient care.
• Utilise expert knowledge to act as specialist resource and increasing the awareness of frailty in primary care to enhance standards of care.
• Ensure the principles of clinical governance and risk management are applied to clinical practice within the speciality.
• To participate actively in audits, sharing co-ordination of audit activities within the department and implementation of change.
• To take an active responsibility for teaching, training and supervision.
• To ensure at all times that you comply with the General Medical Councils published guide Good Medical Practice including the Duties of a Doctor.
• To take personal responsibility for risk management in your work and undertake to review practices and learn from mistakes.
• To provide prospective cover for colleagues during annual and study leave and other absences as far as is practicable and clinically safe.
• Involvement in the development of clinical management protocols shared with the community and other consultant colleagues.
• To undertake an annual job plan review with Clinical Lead for Local Care/Frailty and Director of Operations.
• To take part in safeguarding discussions as part of the MDT where required. Discussions will be supported by WKPCs Head of Quality and Governance and the GP practice.

Person Specification

• Educated to degree level in relevant subject or equivalent level.
• Registered with the GMC and on GP Performers List.
• Previous experience as Primary Care General Practitioner.
• Knowledge of EMIS.
• Experience of managing a patient caseload.
• Basic knowledge of previously worked in similar position within the health sector.
• Able to use Microsoft Office applications with above average capability with Word, Excel and PowerPoint.
• Postgraduate qualification related to frailty (e.g., Diploma/ MSc in Geriatric Medicine, MRCP or equivalent).
• Leadership, teaching and service development experience in audits, quality improvement (QI) activities, or clinical governance.
• Capability to supervise/training others (e.g., ACPs, trainees).
• Demonstrated leadership in service design and improvement, pathway integration, and MDT coordination.
• Senior clinical decision-making in community or intermediate care.
• Skills in delivering interventions at home.
• Skills in CGA-led care, polypharmacy review, falls assessment, advance care planning.
• Excellent communication, documentation, and interprofessional collaboration skills.
• Driving license and access to own vehicle for patient home visits.

Experience

• Experience of working in or shadowing a community frailty service.
• Experience of carrying out Comprehensive Geriatric Assessments (CGA) in hospital, ED, virtual wards, or community setting.
• Experience integrating care between primary and secondary frailty services.

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.