Physician Associate

Job responsibilities

As a Physician Associate you will be acting within your professional boundaries, providing care for patients from initial history taking, clinical assessment, diagnosis, treatment and evaluation of their care under the supervision of a GP. You will demonstrate safe, clinical decision-making and expert care for patients within the practice, in consultation with the relevant GP. You will work within your professional boundaries as part of the surgery team.

Your work will demonstrate improvement in patient outcomes, contributing to reduce health inequalities in the surgery , improving the efficiency of general practice and delivering a best in class service.

Mentorship and supervision will be provided by designated medical personnel. The level and type of supervision will be dependent on the post holders skills and knowledge and determined by the organisations clinical governance arrangements. You will follow recommended annual appraisals and continuing professional development set out by the Faculty of Physician Associates (FPA).

You will be a core part of the growing surgery team, providing services to the patients registered with the GP practice.

Scope and purpose of the role

• To deliver a high standard of patient care using advanced autonomous clinical skills with in-depth theoretical knowledge and evidence-based practice working under the supervision of a GP
• To manage a clinical caseload and deal with presenting patients needs in a primary care setting
• To provide clinical leadership where appropriate within the surgery team, supporting other members of the team to develop and maintain clinical skills appropriate to your role and expertise.

Primary Duties and Areas of Responsibility

All Physician Associates must work within their competencies and have professional indemnity for their role.

Clinical

• Provide first point of contact for patients presenting with undifferentiated, undiagnosed problems, utilising history taking, physical examination, problem-solving and clinical decision-making skills to establish a working diagnosis and management plan working in partnership with patients.
• Undertake consultations (in person, video and telephone) for emergency or routine problems including management of long-term conditions.
• Instigate necessary invasive and non-invasive diagnostic tests or investigations and interpret findings/reports within your scope of competence. Discuss the result and implications of laboratory investigations with patients.
• Utilise local and national clinical guidelines and promote evidence-based practice.
• Offer a holistic service to patients and their families, developing where appropriate an on-going plan of care/support with an emphasis on prevention and self-care.
• Refer patients directly to other services or agencies using appropriate referral pathways.
• Ensure safe handover of care within the surgery
• Work directly with members of the surgery and support integrated patient-centered care through appropriate working with the wider primary care and social care networks.
• Identify community health needs and participate in the development of patient and family-centered strategies to address them.
• Contribute to the delivery of the practice targets to consistently achieve high standards of safe, evidence-based, cost-effective patient care and service delivery.

Quality:

The post-holder will strive to maintain quality within the practice, and will:

Alert other team members to issues of quality and risk

Assess own performance and take accountability for own actions, either directly or under supervision

Contribute to the effectiveness of the team by reflecting on own and team activities and making suggestions on ways to improve and enhance the teams performance

Work effectively with individuals in other agencies to meet patients needs

Effectively manage own time, workload and resources

Training and Development

• Participate in continuing professional development opportunities to keep up-to-date with evidence-based knowledge and competence in all aspects of the role to meet clinical governance guidelines for Continuing Professional Development (CPD) and a Personal Development Plan (PDP) utilising a reflective approach to Practice. This requires 50 hours of CPD every year.
• Undertake a variety of research and analysis tasks associated with the improvement of clinical care, medical diagnosis and treatment where appropriate using the following means.
• Audit of clinical practice
• Significant event review / root cause analyses
• Review of relevant literature
• Research unusual symptoms and treatment options through consultation with general practitioners, and the wider practice.
• Promote and support a learning culture within the practice and assist in clinical instruction, mentoring and supervision of medical, nursing or physician associate students and other learners that may periodically be attached to the practice and partner practices.
• Contribute to regular practice meetings and OHP educational meetings.
• Work closely with other clinical staff and administrative managers in the setting up and/or improving of practice and practice systems for monitoring/measuring performance 

Administration

• Fully document all aspects of patient care and complete all required paperwork for legal and administrative purposes in accordance with relevant standards.
• Work in accordance with internal administrative systems relating to but not limited to the management of clinical data.

• Send and receive written information on behalf of the patient, practice  relating to the physical and social welfare of patients.
• Work closely with other members of the practice in the setting up and/or improving of systems for monitoring and measuring performance against the PCN DES, QOF and any other relevant targets.
• Ensure that all practice and organisational policies are fully implemented.

Professional

• Take the UK PA National Re-Certification Exam every six years - required for Physician Associates AND maintain your professional registration working within the latest Code of Professional Conduct (CIPD).
• Undertake statutory and mandatory training as required by the practice.
• Demonstrate clinical leadership.
• Respect patient confidentiality at all times and not divulge patient information unless sanctioned by the requirements of the role.

Communication and working relationships

Establish and maintain effective communication pathways with all  Practice staff including MDT members such as district nurses, modern matrons, health visitors etc.

Key Relationships

Key Working Relationships Internal:

GPs and General practice team

Multi-disciplinary team. members including but not exhaustive: Clinical Pharmacists, technicians, Physician Associates, Physios, Paramedics, Social Prescribing Link Workers, Care coordinators.

OHP clinical and non-clinical staff.

Key Working Relationships External:

Social care

Voluntary services

Patients/service users

Carers/relatives

Health and Safety/Risk Management

The post-holder must comply at all times with the organisation and Practices Health and Safety policies, in particular by following agreed safe working procedures and reporting incidents using the organisations Incident Reporting System.

The post-holder will comply with the Data Protection Act (1984), The General Data Protection Regulations (2018) and the Access to Health Records Act (1990).

The post-holder will comply with all necessary training requirements relevant to the role as identified by the organisation.

Equality and Diversity

The post-holder must co-operate with all policies and procedures designed to ensure equality of employment. Co-workers, patients and visitors must be treated equally irrespective of gender, ethnic origin, age, disability, sexual orientation, religion etc.

Respect for Patient Confidentiality

The post-holder should always respect patient confidentiality and not divulge patient information unless sanctioned by the requirements of the role.

Special Working Conditions

The post-holder is required to travel independently  (where applicable), and to attend meetings etc. hosted by other agencies.

Qualifications

Essential

• PG Dip/MSc in Physician Associate studies from a UK training programme or recognised equivalent.
• Current and valid certification or re-certification by the Physician Associate National Examination Board.
• Registration on the UK PA Managed Voluntary Register held by the Faculty of Physician Associates at the RCP.

Desirable

• Experience of dealing with patients with undifferentiated and undiagnosed conditions.
• Experience of working in a medical environment.
• Previous experience of working in general practice.
• Experience in preventative medicine and chronic disease management.
• Experience in performing clinical audit.

Experience

Essential

• Advanced clinical practice skills
• Clinical examination skills
• Management of patients with common acute medical conditions
• Management of patients with common acute medical conditions
• Management of patients with long-term conditions
• Knowledge of the NHS
• Understanding of the current issues and challenges facing primary care
• Recent experience of working in a UK General Practice environment
• Ability to work well with colleagues and within a team
• Ability to organise and prioritise workload effectively
• Ability to exercise sound judgements when faced with conflicting pressures
• Confident in use of email
• Excellent record keeping skills
• Sound IT knowledge/IT literacy (Microsoft 365, etc.)
• Ability to work flexibly to meet the needs of the Practice
• Highly motivated
• Energy and enthusiasm
• The ability to work under pressure
• An enquiring and critical approach to work
• Caring attitude to patients
• Ability to communicate effectively with colleagues, patients, relatives and agencies
• Commitment to Continuing Clinical Education and Professional Development

Desirable

• Management of patients with complex needs
• Experience of preventative medicine
• Experience with chronic disease management
• Experience of working to achieve standard within the Quality and Outcome Framework (QOF)
• knowledge of system one

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.

UK Registration

Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).