Patient Access Officer, Band 3- Ophthalmology

Job summary

We are looking for a new member of the team to provide administrative and clerical support to our Age Related Macular Degeneration team based at Gloucester Royal Hospital. This will be working as part of our AMD Team in booking, processing and booking of patients for injection clinic, rapid access and virtual clinics within Trust/National waiting time targets.

The successful applicant will be expected to work in keeping with all relevant Trust and Departmental policies. The role includes liaising closely with admin, clinical and nursing colleagues in the AMD team, wider ophthalmology team also with clinical staff to ensure the smooth running of the patient journey.

The position includes answering telephone calls from patients to book or amend their date of appointment, validation of patients on Outpatient Waiting list and to ensure patients are booked in a timely fashion. It can involve high volume telephone calls from patients as well as dealing with ancillary queries, preparation of paperwork and other general administrative duties that form part of the role.

Main duties of the job

- Contact patients for Outpatient appointments (AMD, Rapid access and virtual clinics) including negotiating appointments with patients wherever possible.

- Contacting patients with appointments either by telephone if urgent or by letter, this could include a series of appointments for some patients to be booked in certain timescales due to clinical need.

- To be prepared to ring and cancel patients at very short notice whilst booking urgent patients on to clinic alternative clinics simultaneously.

- Book patients within clinical and trust waiting time targets.

- Process cancellations and re-appoint patients observing trust waiting times.

- Ensure that patients are aware of their appointment dates and all relevant information.

- Fully utilise all clinic capacity and maintaining outpatient waiting lists of patients who are fit, willing and able to come in at short notice.

- Liaison with clinical staff.

- Validate each patient's pathway by checking and updating RTT codes

About us

The Ophthalmology Department is a large Specialty within the Surgical Division. There are a wide range of roles within the department who work across Cheltenham General and Gloucestershire Royal.

The team work alongside and with a lot of staffing groups, such as Consultants, Doctors, Optometrists, Orthoptists, Imaging, Diabetic Screening as well as Admin & Clerical.

The role works within the Age related Macular Degeneration Team, vital to supporting the fast track care for patients within that subspecialty. The team is made up of 3 full time staff, managed by the RTT Navigator and Failsafe Officer.