Lead General Practice Nurse

Job description

Job responsibilities

JOB PURPOSE

The Lead General Practice Nurse (Enhanced Level) is a highly experienced General Practice Nurse (GPN) working at an enhanced level, providing visible Practice Nurse leadership across Taurus Healthcare clinical services.

The post holder will be responsible for supporting the training and development of nurses, and providing educational signposting, nurse supervision, and competency assessments, in support of the Primary Care and General Practice Nursing (GPN) Career and Core Capability Framework. The post holder will work within their own level of expertise, linking in with the Herefordshire and Worcestershire Training Hub who will provide additional support and shared expertise.

The role will be responsible for key areas such as, but not limited to:

Leading on and providing supervision of training, educational support, and assessment of general practice nursing competencies

Supporting clinical governance activities including audits, policy and quality improvement

Contributing to quality and safety reports

Supporting patient safety, incident reporting, investigation and management of patient complaints and concerns.

Providing clinical supervision and support.

Supporting clinical pathway development, collaborating with wider GPN and community nursing colleagues across Herefordshire to improve nursing care pathways

Delivery and dissemination of evidence-based practice within nursing teams.

Ensuring infection prevention control and standards of environmental cleanliness are maintained in clinical/service areas.

Conducting GPN appraisals.

Supporting recruitment activities, including interviewing of GPNs, Nurse Associates and HCAs

Providing nursing advice, guidance and support to the operational management team when Associate Directors are not immediately available.

The role requires visibility within the clinical environment that includes but is not limited to, the GP Out of Hours and Enhanced Access services and Prevention Services such as the seasonal vaccination programmes, NHS Health Checks and Talk Wellbeing services for Herefordshire General Practice.

To ensure the Lead GPN can demonstrate and maintain current clinical knowledge at an enhanced level of practice, the post holder will be required to undertake a minimum of one clinical session a week, which will be incorporated into the role.

The post holder will lead by example as a positive role model with a focus on education, high quality care and patient safety. They will be an effective communicator with strong interpersonal skills and a strong desire to facilitate the learning of others.

The post holder will be required to work flexibly which will include some weekend and evening working to support the development of the teams and services and adapt to the local delivery requirements of national programmes which may sometimes be at short notice.

The postholder is required to work at the enhanced GPN level of practice, as set out in the Primary Care and General Practice Nursing Career and Core Capability Framework.

Role Core Competencies (Registered Nurse: Enhanced Level Practice)

Will require a critical understanding of detailed theoretical and practical knowledge, which can be generalist with a special interest and/or have management and leadership responsibilities.

Have specialist knowledge, skills, and capabilities.

Ability to support junior roles in their development and competency achievement.

Consult with patients, their family, and the multi-professional team to undertake assessments of patient need and devise and evaluate complex care plans.

Evaluate and analyse clinical problems using their clinical knowledge, seeking out and applying relevant evidence, enhanced techniques, interventions, and equipment to make clinical decisions.

Deliver enhanced clinical care in the context of continual change, challenging environments, different models of care delivery, innovation and rapidly evolving technologies using analysis and their underpinning knowledge to manage complex interventions.

Teach and advise patients and their families on how to manage their condition or support the multi-disciplinary team to do so.

Participate in clinical audits and research projects and implement changes as required, including the development, and updating of practice protocols / guidelines and procedures locally.

Work within national and local protocols where these exist.

Recognise boundaries of their practice and know when and to whom patients should be referred.

Delegate work to other members of the multidisciplinary team and take accountability for the delegated activity.

Demonstrate initiative and are creative in finding solutions to problems.

Responsibility for team performance and service development and they consistently undertake self-development.

The role will also require the post holder to deliver, oversee, and educate staff on core patient activities such as:

Simple and complex wound management with adherence to evidence-based practice and local formulary.

Provision of vaccines and safe storage for all ages in line with national guidance/SOPs/PGDs

Administering routine injections such as B12 and decapeptyl as prescribed

Undertaking cervical cytology screening

Contraception care and sexual health assessment and signposting

Long term condition management and annual checks

Supervision of junior clinical staff and students

Role Enhanced Competencies may include:

Provision of nurse led long term condition clinics for people with diabetes, CHD, heart failure, stroke / TIA, PAD, hypertension, CKD, diabetes, asthma, and COPD as required.

Person Specification

Experience

Essential

• - Experience of working in primary care as general practice nurse at enhanced level.
• - Experience of nurse led chronic disease management clinics.
• - Experience of working in a multi-professional environment.
• - Experience of wound management.
• - Immunisation experience.

Personal Qualities or Attributes

Essential

• - Work a flexible pattern of evenings, weekends and bank holidays and cover team annual leave and sickness when applicable.
• - Organised, friendly, approachable, polite, and empathetic.
• - Adaptable and comfortable dealing with changing priorities and be a team player.
• - Ability to travel around the county as required.

Qualifications

Essential

• - Part 1 of the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) Register.
• - First degree or equivalent.
• - Minimum 2 years recent GPN experience.
• - GPN fundamentals qualification or demonstrable equivalent training or experience.
• - Nurse supervisor/assessor training.
• - Recent immunisation training (that meets PHE National Minimum Standards and Core Curriculum for Immunisation Training for Registered Healthcare Practitioners).

Desirable

• - Independent / Supplementary Nurse Prescribing (V300).
• - Teaching qualification.
• - Contraception and sexual health qualification/training.
• - Cervical cytology practitioner.
• - Lower limb tier 2 trained and competent.

Skills

Essential

• - Work autonomously and collaboratively.
• - Effective team player.
• - Excellent communication skills both written and verbal.
• - Competent use of EMIS, Microsoft office and other IT programmes.
• - Able to organise and plan own workload effectively.

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).

Employer details

Employer name

Taurus Healthcare Limited

Address

Suite 1, Berrows Business Centre

Bath Street

Hereford

Herefordshire

HR1 2HE

Employer's website

https://www.herefordshiregeneralpractice.co.uk (Opens in a new tab)