Job summary
The Greater Manchester Community Neuro & Stroke rehab model was launched in 2018 with the aim of improving clinical pathways for people with neurological conditions. As a result of investment there are new and exciting opportunities within the Wigan & Leigh Community Neuro & Stroke team.
Our current team is comprised of highly experienced Physiotherapists, Occupational therapists, Speech & Language therapists, Nurses, Dietitian and a forward thinking consultant in Neuro rehab all keen to share their knowledge and experience to enhance the care for people in the Wigan borough.
Due to this significant team growth and funding support within the Community Neuro & Stroke Team (CNST) an exciting opportunity has arisen for a Specialist Dietitian Development Post. This is a newly created post and provides an excellent opportunity to develop the dietetic service as the designated Dietitian for the stroke pathway, as well as gain clinical experience on the neuro pathway.
Development posts are ideal for existing Band 5 practitioners to work towards a Band 6 through a supported learning development framework.
The Team currently have 2 bases, Leigh is base for Neuro Pathway and Chandler House, Wigan is base for Stroke Pathway.
Main duties of the job
You will be responsible for the provision of specialist dietetic assessment and advice to individuals with a range of neurological conditions in the community. The caseload will involve supporting patients in a variety of settings which may include: outpatient clinics, care homes, intermediate care center's, group education, virtual clinics and in their own homes. You will attend weekly patient progress review meetings and will have the opportunity to develop skills in the IDT management of complex patients.
You will be an advocate of evidence-based practice and actively involved in the education and training of other HCPs within CNST. As a department we are committed to CPD. We are looking for a motivated, positive, and flexible person to assist in the on-going development and improvement of our growing team.
You will be clinically supervised and work alongside the band 7 Neuro dietitian. The CNST has close links with the Greater Manchester Integrated Neuro & Stroke delivery network as well as neighboring acute trusts. This position presents an emphasis to further develop your clinical and service development skills and you will be encouraged to take an active role in supervision, project work, research, and service development.
About us
Choose Well - Choose WWL
Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh NHS Foundation Trust are the proud providers of acute hospital and community services to the people of the Wigan Borough and surrounding areas. At WWL, we value our staff believing that 'happy staff, makes for happy patients'. We have a recognised track record in staff engagement and living our values 'the WWL Way'.
WWL are committed to placing the patient at the heart of everything we do, and in the provision of safe, effective care that acknowledges and ensures dignity. With this in mind we are seeking to recruit people who share our values and beliefs.
COVID-19 vaccination remains the best way to protect yourself, your family, your colleagues and of course our patients from the virus when working in our healthcare settings. Whilst COVID-19 vaccination is not a condition of employment, we do encourage our staff to get vaccinated. If you are unvaccinated there is helpful advice and information available by contacting covid-19.vaccine@wwl.nhs.uk where you can also ask about how to access vaccinations.
This post involves contact with patients and families face to face within a community setting. Therefore it cannot be ruled out that the postholder may come in to contact with people who have COVID-19, although the Trust provides PPE and takes all reasonable steps to minimise risk.
An Enhanced DBS with Adults' Barred List checks will be obtained during pre-employment checks.
Job description
Job responsibilities
Duties and Responsibilities
- The post holder will work independently (work will be self-directed and autonomous) to manage and provide a dietetic service within the CNST, seeking peer support, if necessary, through their clinical team, band 7 dietitian or via specialist dietetic networks.
- To deliver a responsive and patient focused specialist dietetic service to support good nutritional care for patients living with stroke and neurological conditions in the community, including those discharged from hospital under the ESD service.
- To make dietary recommendations after calculation of nutritional requirements based on interpretation of biochemistry, anthropometrics, anatomy and physiology, clinical condition/prognosis, and other physical parameters.
- To provide dietetic and lifestyle counselling to educate a diverse patient population in one-to-one and group settings. To understand the complex dietary changes which are needed and to employ advanced motivational and behavioural change skills to overcome barriers to change, particularly where there is non-compliance.
- To demonstrate excellent verbal and non-verbal communication with the ability to motivate people and empathise with the challenges of long-term condition management.
- To receive and communicate highly complex and sensitive information, which may include unwelcome or difficult information; for example, long-term adherence to complex and multiple dietary interventions or initiation of invasive nutritional support e.g. tube feeding. To present this in an understandable form, to patients and their carers, to facilitate compliance with treatment, leading to improvements in clinical condition.
- To use communication skills and aids, as part of the interdisciplinary team (IDT) to gain informed consent where there will often be barriers to effective communication e.g. challenging behaviours, impaired cognition, anxiety, dysphasia
- To assess capacity, gain valid consent and have the ability to work within a legal framework with patients who lack capacity to consent to treatment.
- To respect the individuality, values, cultural and religious diversity of clients and contribute to the provision of a service sensitive to these needs.
- To accurately maintain assessments and intervention in clinical records in line with national guidance (e.g. data protection act) and internal information governance policies. This includes timely recording in line with HCPC, British Dietetic Association (BDA) standard of practice and local standards.
- To provide appropriate monitoring and review of patients dietary needs, involving other agencies when indicated.
- To contribute to IDT meetings and patient progress meetings. To communicate expert nutritional assessment and advice regarding individual patient care to the team.
- To advise prescribers on any medications which may affect nutritional therapies e.g. laxatives, anti-emetics.
- To advise on appropriate use of nutritional products. To specify product type, quantity, and regimen to meet individual patient needs.
- To be responsible for organising the nutritional needs of patients on alternative feeding on the ISNT caseload. This includes prescription of feeds, liaising with district nursing, other hospital trusts, medical and dietetic teams and the companies providing the feed in the community.
- To be accountable for the appropriate supply of nutritional products to care homes and peoples own homes. This will include oral nutritional supplements, and enteral feeds.
- To advise patients and other healthcare professionals on a range of feeding tubes, tube care, stoma care and appropriate treatment or troubleshooting solutions to limit unnecessary hospital admissions. To work as an effective member of the ISNT and liaising with the Nutrition Nurses.
- To be competent in the use of Microsoft Office, feed company enteral feeding ordering systems, and other NHS informatics systems as a requirement of the post.
- To work in a frequently stressful environment with patients who may be critically ill, chronically ill, terminally ill or undergoing long periods of rehabilitation. To support patients and their carers, both nutritionally and emotionally, during their disease.
- To undertake any other duties commensurate with the post as requested by the operational team lead.
Planning and Organisational Duties
- To promote safe caseload/workload management, using appropriate assessment, organisational, time management and reporting skills. To be professionally accountable for all aspects of clinical workload.
- To ensure own practice is up to date and evidence based, and able to demonstrate an awareness of current relevant research through teaching, attending courses/study days and peer review.
- To plan, support and deliver secondary prevention and health promotion after stroke activities for patients e.g. group education sessions, displays, posters and health promotion campaigns.
- To identify the need for educational resources for patients treated within the specialty. To lead and develop non-biased evidence based written materials and teaching resources, as required, for a diverse client group. To undertake regular review of these resources.
- To identify nutritional training needs of other healthcare staff within the area of clinical specialty. To develop, plan and deliver training in relevant aspects of nutrition and dietetics. To evaluate and monitor this training to promote understanding of nutrition in relation to patient care and improvement in quality of care.
- To play a key role in meetings related to service development within dietetics and stroke and report back to the operational and dietetic leads.
- To identify and implement service and practice development within own area of clinical specialism in conjunction with operational team lead and/or highly specialist dietitian, as well as national and local guidelines.
- To support the service in developing care pathways which reflect the requirements of the service users and the commissioners to develop evidence-based nutrition related guidance and pathways.
- To comply with departmental requirements for the data collection and assist the operational team lead with interpretation of clinical outcomes in specialist area.
Communications and Key Working Relationships
- To provide specialist nutrition and dietetic input to an IDT including, medical, nursing, AHPs and support staff. To maintain good working relationships with all these disciplines.
- To work with the highly specialist neuro dietitian to share knowledge and develop nutritional standards, protocols and guidelines which can be implemented in the team and Trust.
- To provide a dietetic service at one or more sites in line with CNST service model and cover for the highly specialist neuro dietitian during periods of absence if required.
- To regularly communicate with other agencies including GPs, consultants, community nurses and dietitians about patient care e.g. prescription requests for nutritional products, home enteral feeding forms and nutrition care plans.
- To play a key role in the training of support staff.
- To effectively communicate to convey information on diagnosis, prognosis and treatment plans in a range of verbal and non-verbal forms that clients/relatives can understand.
- To act as an advocate for patients needs when necessary.
Responsibility for Finance
- To advise the operational team lead on resources required to carry out the job.
- To be responsible for the monitoring of materials and equipment and bring defects or deficits to the attention of the operational team lead.
- To advise, assess and provide appropriate equipment for patient use within resources available in Health, Social Services and Education.
Responsibility for Human Resources
- To be responsible for working within locally agreed protocols and guidelines.
- To actively participate and comply with the annual PDP and appraisal system.
- To plan and implement the induction of junior staff/students.
- To receive, plan and deliver in-service training for own profession and others.
- To undertake the supervision of junior staff as delegated by senior staff.
- To regularly supervise, evaluate and assess students to include negotiating learning contracts and setting objectives.
- To contribute to development of practice/procedures etc. within the CNST.
- To ensure annual retention on Health Professions Council Register to maintain state registration, taking responsibility for own continued professional development and document this evidence in a professional portfolio, showing proof of competence to practise within the NHS.
- To take responsibility for ensuring clinical supervision needs are met and personal development plans are undertaken.
Responsibility for Teaching
- To take part in training/education of colleagues and staff/students of other disciplines.
- To plans, organise and present clinical teaching programmes for medical staff, health care professionals and patient groups in response to identified need.
- To promote the service to the wider community delivering awareness training to other health professionals, as required.
- To be responsible for providing clinical education placements and liaising with students/universities.
Job description
Job responsibilities
Duties and Responsibilities
- The post holder will work independently (work will be self-directed and autonomous) to manage and provide a dietetic service within the CNST, seeking peer support, if necessary, through their clinical team, band 7 dietitian or via specialist dietetic networks.
- To deliver a responsive and patient focused specialist dietetic service to support good nutritional care for patients living with stroke and neurological conditions in the community, including those discharged from hospital under the ESD service.
- To make dietary recommendations after calculation of nutritional requirements based on interpretation of biochemistry, anthropometrics, anatomy and physiology, clinical condition/prognosis, and other physical parameters.
- To provide dietetic and lifestyle counselling to educate a diverse patient population in one-to-one and group settings. To understand the complex dietary changes which are needed and to employ advanced motivational and behavioural change skills to overcome barriers to change, particularly where there is non-compliance.
- To demonstrate excellent verbal and non-verbal communication with the ability to motivate people and empathise with the challenges of long-term condition management.
- To receive and communicate highly complex and sensitive information, which may include unwelcome or difficult information; for example, long-term adherence to complex and multiple dietary interventions or initiation of invasive nutritional support e.g. tube feeding. To present this in an understandable form, to patients and their carers, to facilitate compliance with treatment, leading to improvements in clinical condition.
- To use communication skills and aids, as part of the interdisciplinary team (IDT) to gain informed consent where there will often be barriers to effective communication e.g. challenging behaviours, impaired cognition, anxiety, dysphasia
- To assess capacity, gain valid consent and have the ability to work within a legal framework with patients who lack capacity to consent to treatment.
- To respect the individuality, values, cultural and religious diversity of clients and contribute to the provision of a service sensitive to these needs.
- To accurately maintain assessments and intervention in clinical records in line with national guidance (e.g. data protection act) and internal information governance policies. This includes timely recording in line with HCPC, British Dietetic Association (BDA) standard of practice and local standards.
- To provide appropriate monitoring and review of patients dietary needs, involving other agencies when indicated.
- To contribute to IDT meetings and patient progress meetings. To communicate expert nutritional assessment and advice regarding individual patient care to the team.
- To advise prescribers on any medications which may affect nutritional therapies e.g. laxatives, anti-emetics.
- To advise on appropriate use of nutritional products. To specify product type, quantity, and regimen to meet individual patient needs.
- To be responsible for organising the nutritional needs of patients on alternative feeding on the ISNT caseload. This includes prescription of feeds, liaising with district nursing, other hospital trusts, medical and dietetic teams and the companies providing the feed in the community.
- To be accountable for the appropriate supply of nutritional products to care homes and peoples own homes. This will include oral nutritional supplements, and enteral feeds.
- To advise patients and other healthcare professionals on a range of feeding tubes, tube care, stoma care and appropriate treatment or troubleshooting solutions to limit unnecessary hospital admissions. To work as an effective member of the ISNT and liaising with the Nutrition Nurses.
- To be competent in the use of Microsoft Office, feed company enteral feeding ordering systems, and other NHS informatics systems as a requirement of the post.
- To work in a frequently stressful environment with patients who may be critically ill, chronically ill, terminally ill or undergoing long periods of rehabilitation. To support patients and their carers, both nutritionally and emotionally, during their disease.
- To undertake any other duties commensurate with the post as requested by the operational team lead.
Planning and Organisational Duties
- To promote safe caseload/workload management, using appropriate assessment, organisational, time management and reporting skills. To be professionally accountable for all aspects of clinical workload.
- To ensure own practice is up to date and evidence based, and able to demonstrate an awareness of current relevant research through teaching, attending courses/study days and peer review.
- To plan, support and deliver secondary prevention and health promotion after stroke activities for patients e.g. group education sessions, displays, posters and health promotion campaigns.
- To identify the need for educational resources for patients treated within the specialty. To lead and develop non-biased evidence based written materials and teaching resources, as required, for a diverse client group. To undertake regular review of these resources.
- To identify nutritional training needs of other healthcare staff within the area of clinical specialty. To develop, plan and deliver training in relevant aspects of nutrition and dietetics. To evaluate and monitor this training to promote understanding of nutrition in relation to patient care and improvement in quality of care.
- To play a key role in meetings related to service development within dietetics and stroke and report back to the operational and dietetic leads.
- To identify and implement service and practice development within own area of clinical specialism in conjunction with operational team lead and/or highly specialist dietitian, as well as national and local guidelines.
- To support the service in developing care pathways which reflect the requirements of the service users and the commissioners to develop evidence-based nutrition related guidance and pathways.
- To comply with departmental requirements for the data collection and assist the operational team lead with interpretation of clinical outcomes in specialist area.
Communications and Key Working Relationships
- To provide specialist nutrition and dietetic input to an IDT including, medical, nursing, AHPs and support staff. To maintain good working relationships with all these disciplines.
- To work with the highly specialist neuro dietitian to share knowledge and develop nutritional standards, protocols and guidelines which can be implemented in the team and Trust.
- To provide a dietetic service at one or more sites in line with CNST service model and cover for the highly specialist neuro dietitian during periods of absence if required.
- To regularly communicate with other agencies including GPs, consultants, community nurses and dietitians about patient care e.g. prescription requests for nutritional products, home enteral feeding forms and nutrition care plans.
- To play a key role in the training of support staff.
- To effectively communicate to convey information on diagnosis, prognosis and treatment plans in a range of verbal and non-verbal forms that clients/relatives can understand.
- To act as an advocate for patients needs when necessary.
Responsibility for Finance
- To advise the operational team lead on resources required to carry out the job.
- To be responsible for the monitoring of materials and equipment and bring defects or deficits to the attention of the operational team lead.
- To advise, assess and provide appropriate equipment for patient use within resources available in Health, Social Services and Education.
Responsibility for Human Resources
- To be responsible for working within locally agreed protocols and guidelines.
- To actively participate and comply with the annual PDP and appraisal system.
- To plan and implement the induction of junior staff/students.
- To receive, plan and deliver in-service training for own profession and others.
- To undertake the supervision of junior staff as delegated by senior staff.
- To regularly supervise, evaluate and assess students to include negotiating learning contracts and setting objectives.
- To contribute to development of practice/procedures etc. within the CNST.
- To ensure annual retention on Health Professions Council Register to maintain state registration, taking responsibility for own continued professional development and document this evidence in a professional portfolio, showing proof of competence to practise within the NHS.
- To take responsibility for ensuring clinical supervision needs are met and personal development plans are undertaken.
Responsibility for Teaching
- To take part in training/education of colleagues and staff/students of other disciplines.
- To plans, organise and present clinical teaching programmes for medical staff, health care professionals and patient groups in response to identified need.
- To promote the service to the wider community delivering awareness training to other health professionals, as required.
- To be responsible for providing clinical education placements and liaising with students/universities.
Person Specification
Qualifications
Essential
- BSc (Hons) degree in Nutrition & Dietetics / post graduate diploma or equivalent
- Registration with the HCPC
Desirable
- Member of the British Dietetic Association (BDA)
- Member and / or attendance of specialist interest group
- Attendance at relevant multidisciplinary courses / conferences
Experience
Essential
- NHS experience
- Experience in a broad range of clinical areas including more complex clinical area: stroke / neuro / enteral feeding.
- Experience of working as part of an interdisciplinary team
- Experience with teaching and training (e.g clinical supervisory skills/student training/communication skill training/counselling skills training)
Desirable
- Experience of working in the community
- Experience of establishing a new area of service
Skills
Essential
- To utilise developed oral and written communication skills with patients, colleagues and members of interdisciplinary team to enhance patient care in more complex situations
- To work effectively as part of a team
- Ability to deal with distressed or challenging patients
- Advanced clinical reasoning skills
- To demonstrate presentation skills, being able to plan, deliver and evaluate teaching sessions to both patients and staff groups
- To maintain accurate documentation manually and electronically in line with professional standards
- To organise and prioritise a clinical caseload and allocated project work
- To be proactive and committed to raising the profile of the profession
- To show confidence and motivation in meetings on named specialist matters
- To demonstrate accurate IT skills for clinical and data inputting, dietary analysis and presentations
Desirable
- Demonstrable leadership skills within specific project areas
- Skills in managing, interpreting and reporting data effectively
Knowledge
Essential
- Good knowledge of and the ability to apply evidence-based practice within relevant dietetic areas and neuro / stroke
- Good knowledge of relevant national and professional policies
- Awareness of relevant research and audit skills to inform and evaluate practice.
- Keeps up to date with clinical developments, with evidence of contributions to clinical meetings.
Additional
Essential
- Able to travel across Trust independently
- Speak English to an appropriate standard relevant to their role i.e. with confidence and accuracy, using correct sentence structures and vocabulary, and without hesitation
- Flexible to meet service demand
Desirable
- The ability to support the movement of patients for weighing purposes
Person Specification
Qualifications
Essential
- BSc (Hons) degree in Nutrition & Dietetics / post graduate diploma or equivalent
- Registration with the HCPC
Desirable
- Member of the British Dietetic Association (BDA)
- Member and / or attendance of specialist interest group
- Attendance at relevant multidisciplinary courses / conferences
Experience
Essential
- NHS experience
- Experience in a broad range of clinical areas including more complex clinical area: stroke / neuro / enteral feeding.
- Experience of working as part of an interdisciplinary team
- Experience with teaching and training (e.g clinical supervisory skills/student training/communication skill training/counselling skills training)
Desirable
- Experience of working in the community
- Experience of establishing a new area of service
Skills
Essential
- To utilise developed oral and written communication skills with patients, colleagues and members of interdisciplinary team to enhance patient care in more complex situations
- To work effectively as part of a team
- Ability to deal with distressed or challenging patients
- Advanced clinical reasoning skills
- To demonstrate presentation skills, being able to plan, deliver and evaluate teaching sessions to both patients and staff groups
- To maintain accurate documentation manually and electronically in line with professional standards
- To organise and prioritise a clinical caseload and allocated project work
- To be proactive and committed to raising the profile of the profession
- To show confidence and motivation in meetings on named specialist matters
- To demonstrate accurate IT skills for clinical and data inputting, dietary analysis and presentations
Desirable
- Demonstrable leadership skills within specific project areas
- Skills in managing, interpreting and reporting data effectively
Knowledge
Essential
- Good knowledge of and the ability to apply evidence-based practice within relevant dietetic areas and neuro / stroke
- Good knowledge of relevant national and professional policies
- Awareness of relevant research and audit skills to inform and evaluate practice.
- Keeps up to date with clinical developments, with evidence of contributions to clinical meetings.
Additional
Essential
- Able to travel across Trust independently
- Speak English to an appropriate standard relevant to their role i.e. with confidence and accuracy, using correct sentence structures and vocabulary, and without hesitation
- Flexible to meet service demand
Desirable
- The ability to support the movement of patients for weighing purposes
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.
Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).
From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).
UK Registration
Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see
NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).
Additional information
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.
Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).
From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).
UK Registration
Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see
NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).
