Bank Chaplain

Job summary

This is an exciting bank post for an experienced practitioner who wants to take the next step in delivering spiritual, pastoral, and religious care in a hospital environment.Are you a faith representative in good standing and able to be endorsed (meeting the appointment criteria) by their faith/belief/philosophical non-belief body as laid out in the Network for Pastoral, Spiritual and Religious Care in Health (NPSRCH)?Looking to work in a supportive values-based environment and job role?Do you want to join a team of spiritual care practitioners who are ambitious and committed to developing best practice and delivering best care within a modern healthcare environment?If you answer yes to each of the above questions, please read on and refer to the attached job description and consider joining the team here in Somerset.

Main duties of the job

Working as a bank Chaplain at Somerset NHS Foundation Trust you will seek to establish relationships of trust and support with all those in the post-holder's care, identifying SPaRC needs and responding to them. You will:

• Engage in the assessment, delivery, enablement, monitoring and recording of person-centred SPaRC which addresses the individual and collective needs of the hospital community.
• Provide safe, effective, compassionate, and responsive care and interventions that address the identified holistic SPaRC needs of people to support healing and wholeness, within the parameters of the role and in accordance with professional codes of conduct and clinical governance.
• Respond to people in spiritual distress including those who may show challenging behaviours or have complex needs by using professional and pastoral knowledge, skills, and practice.
• Take active steps to work with, involve and support people in addressing their own healthcare needs, maximising their potential healing and wholeness within the limits of their illness.
• Provide or enable, within the limitations of the post-holder's religion/belief and faith authority, religious rites as may be requested or required. To include prayer, baptism, blessing, naming, and other rites at times when patients, including children and babies, may be facing complex surgery, approaching the end of life, after death, or following baby loss during pregnancy or soon after.

This is a cross-county role and own transport is required.

About us

At Somerset NHS Foundation Trust we are privileged to work with over 12,500 colleagues who deliver or support our patient services. From therapists to nurses, doctors, researchers, scientists, porters, cleaners, kitchen staff, accountants, those who teach, and the receptionists who welcome our patients, the contribution of all our colleagues is invaluable. We are one of the largest trusts in the southwest, taking a joined-up approach to providing clinical, acute hospital, community health, mental health, learning disability and dental care services. It is what makes the trust an exciting and dynamic environment in which to work and build a progressive career.

We are proud of our skilled, diverse workforce and as an inclusive employer we welcome applications from all backgrounds.

Working in Somerset enables you to enjoy the idyllic countryside, areas of outstanding beauty and stunning coastlines whilst still only being a stone's throw away from bustling city centres like Bristol, Bath and Exeter and only two hours away from London.

There are excellent educational facilities in the area and, when compared to other regions, house prices are reasonable.

Somerset offers the countryside and the cosmopolitan -- there is truly something for everyone!