Job responsibilities
Key results from the job holder
To work as an autonomous and clinically competent practitioner within the Community Dietetic Team assessing and giving highly specialist dietetic advice, treatment and dietary counselling to patients in consultant clinics, community clinics and client homes.
To undertake autonomous assessment and review for the management of complex caseload of diabetes, complications of diabetes and general clinic providing dietetic advice to adults, adolescents, carers and staff within agreed protocols / guidelines based on medical condition, social, cultural, anthropometric analysis, clinical chemistry and psychological factors.
To request clinical chemistry data to assess nutritional status.
To develop, monitor and review appropriate care plans, to meet the needs of individuals using complex numerical calculations, interpretation of clinical, biochemical and psychosocial information and analysis of nutritional intakes using specialist IT systems.
To provide tailored nutritional treatment plans to include carbohydrate counting education with appropriate advice for dose adjustment for normal eating and therapy to enable optimal glycaemic control to be maximised.
To provide diet and lifestyle advice to promote a healthy lifestyle in adults and young people with long term conditions to prevent long term complications.
Develop and modify dietetic treatment and discharge plans referring to other specialists and agencies as appropriate.
Judge the appropriateness of referrals, action dietetic management and advise referring agents of inappropriate referrals.
To recommend appropriate ACBS nutritional products, changes to medication, diagnostic tests and procedures and monitor their use.
Communicate complex nutrition and dietetic information in an understandable form to staff, clients and carers, using negotiation, motivation and counselling skills including situations where there are barriers to understanding.
To act as a source of expertise on nutrition and dietetic topics relating to adults with long term conditions advising and supporting qualified and unqualified healthcare staff and other agencies who are in a position to provide nutritional advice, aiming to ensure accurate and consistent advice and treatment is provided.
Work in conjunction with medical, nursing, professional colleagues and other agencies attending and supporting vulnerable adults in various care settings to include community clinics, home visits, multidisciplinary working and liaising with hospital wards to support prompt delivery of dietetic care.
Produce timely reports to referring Health Care Professionals regarding patient care.
To identify opportunities to promote health and using innovative methods to develop initiatives to enable the promotion of health. Maintain expertise in other areas of dietetics to ensure continuity of care.
To meet the standards of best practice in accordance with relevant NICE Guidelines.
To manage a defined caseload, working to agreed standards and protocols which reflect evidence based practice and client centred principles to assess, plan, implement and evaluate interventions.
To collect and assimilate information necessary to undertake nutritional assessment and determine nutritional needs of the patient including referral to other disciplines as appropriate.
Assesses and interprets the medical diagnoses and changes in medical condition of individual patient and understands how this affects nutritional management.
To communicate effectively with patients, relatives, care staff, and health care professionals to negotiating and supporting decision making in relation to therapeutic management and evaluating outcomes.
To be able to adapt the communication skills within a variety of settings using various approaches including knowledge of learning theories and barriers to learning.
To take part in clinical supervision and seek advice around any complex situations or residents from Senior Dietitians within the Nutrition Service.
To provide clinical education, advice and support for Dieticians, junior therapy staff, support staff and students.
To supervise, educate and assess the performance of therapy students.
To contribute to service research and audit activities.
To propose any service changes within own professional speciality area.
Planning and Organisational Duties
To be able to demonstrate ability to prioritise workload of self, and other staff within the team, and complete tasks independently with an ability to meet agreed deadlines.
Plan, prioritise and organise own workload working jointly with other professionals and agencies and evaluate own practice.
To liaise and support forward planning of the department including communicating with team lead and management who are in a position to influence service development.
Ensure dietetic practice is up to date, evidence-based and / or based on best practice by participating in appropriate training and development activities.
Actively participate and contribute to clinical supervision to ensure regular evaluation of practice through peer review.
Participate in dietetic operational meetings, sharing knowledge, evaluating and improving service delivery.
Participate in the departments Clinical Governance programme including reviewing evidence / guidance, clinical and professional audits, research and reporting of clinical risks.
Contribute to development and monitoring of departmental clinical policies, guidelines and procedures relevant to areas of work
Evaluate patient information in view of current evidence and produce dietary information in accessible formats as appropriate
To work as an autonomous practitioner working within the BDA Code of professional conduct and HPC Standards of conduct, performance and Ethics and Standards of Proficiency (Dietitians).
Work flexibly to meet the needs of the service.
Be responsible for maintaining patient records in line with trust and department standards GDPR and Data Protection Act requirements.
Document patient activity data daily in accordance with trust and professional standards.
Contributes to the development and maintenance of the profile of the Dietetic profession.
To ensure that all Trust wide and departmental standards and guidelines are maintained and monitored to improve the quality of total care, to all who come into contact with services provided by Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh.
To correspond promptly with care staff, health professionals and GPs with justification of appropriate nutritional treatment plans.
To complete accurate records of clinical work undertaken to comply with national and local standards
To be professionally and legally accountable for all aspects of own work, including the management of patients.
To undertake a comprehensive assessment of patients including those with diverse or complex presentations/multi-pathologies; use advanced clinical reasoning and problem solving skills to provide an accurate prognosis of their condition.
To participate in holistic multi-disciplinary assessments in order to determine client needs.
To assess patient understanding of treatment proposals, gain valid informed consent and have the capacity to work within a legal framework with patients who lack capacity to consent to treatment.
To evaluate the effectiveness of treatments and modify accordingly.
To follow clinical risk management processes within own patient caseload.
To represent the team and patients at multi-disciplinary team meetings and case conferences in order to ensure the delivery of a co-ordinated multi-disciplinary service and to integrate therapy intervention into the treatment programme. This will include discussion of patient care, patient progress and involvement in discharge planning.
To give advice and training on intervention programmes on a one-to-one basis, including advice to carers.
To formulate and deliver individual treatment programmes based on a sound knowledge of evidence based practice and treatment options using clinical assessment, reasoning skills and highly specialised knowledge of intervention techniques
To support the Team Leader and other Highly Specialist / Specialist Dietitians as required.
To work with the patients, carers and colleagues to identify goals as part of intervention plans.
Ensure that documentation is appropriate and accountable; with effective communication, written, verbal and the use of IT, maintaining up to date records and information that comply with the Law, Professional Standards and Trust standards of practice.
Establish and maintain effective communication with colleagues, patient / clients and others, and be empathetic and reassuring when communicating highly sensitive information and advice
The above indicates the main duties of the post, which may be reviewed in the light of experience and developments within the service. Any review will be undertaken in conjunction with the post holder.
To ensure risk assessments are completed as per trust Policy.
To produce medico legal information as required.
