Job summary
- Main area
- Oncology
- Grade
- NHS AfC: Band 4
- Contract
- Permanent
- Hours
- Full time - 37.5 hours per week
- Job ref
- 196-A&C447
- Employer
- Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust
- Employer type
- NHS
- Site
- Guys Hospital
- Town
- London
- Salary
- £30,279 - £33,116 per annum including HCA
- Salary period
- Yearly
- Closing
- 07/07/2024 23:59
Employer heading
Macmillan Cancer Support Worker
NHS AfC: Band 4
Guy’s and St Thomas’ is among the UK’s busiest and most successful NHS foundation trusts. We provide a full range of hospital and community services for people in south London and as well as specialist care for patients from further afield including cancer, renal, orthopaedic, respiratory and cardiovascular services.
Guy’s is home to the largest dental school in Europe and a £160 million Cancer Centre opened in 2016. As part of our commitment to provide care closer to home, in 2017 we also opened a cancer centre and a kidney treatment centre at Queen Mary’s Hospital in Sidcup. St Thomas’ has one of the largest critical care units in the UK and one of the busiest emergency departments in London. It is also home to Evelina London Children’s Hospital.
Evelina London cares for local children in Lambeth and Southwark and provides specialist services across south east England including cardiac, renal and critical care services. We lead a number of specialist service networks aiming to ensure children are treated locally where possible, but have access to specialist expertise when they need it. Our community services include health visiting, school nursing and support for families of children with long-term conditions.
Our adult community services teams deliver care at the heart of the local communities we serve, working in partnership with GPs, local authorities and other healthcare and voluntary sector organisations. Working with our partners in Lambeth and Southwark, we are focusing on new ways of working to improve care for local patients.
In February 2021 the Royal Brompton and Harefield joined Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, bringing together world-leading expertise in the care and research of heart and lung disease. Our merger provides a once in a generation opportunity to build a lasting, world-renowned heart and lung centre, providing the highest quality care for patients and conducting world-leading research.
We have a reputation for clinical excellence and high quality teaching and research. We are part of King’s Health Partners, one of eight accredited UK academic health sciences centres. In partnership with King’s College London we have dedicated clinical research facilities including an MHRA accredited Phase I clinical trials unit.
Patients are at the heart of everything we do and we pride ourselves on ensuring the best possible patient experience as well as safe, high quality care. We are proud to have one of the lowest mortality rates in the NHS. Following a comprehensive Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspection in 2019 we maintained our overall rating of ‘good’. Our adult community services achieved a rating of ‘outstanding’.
The commitment of our 23,500 staff is key to our success. We are one of the largest local employers and we aim to develop and support all our staff so they are able to deliver high quality, safe and efficient care. The 2019 NHS staff survey results show that we have one of the most engaged and motivated workforces in the NHS. We know this has a positive impact on the care provided to our patients.
We have one of the most ambitious capital investment programmes anywhere in the NHS.
Job overview
The post holder will support the coordination of care for cancer patients through their cancer pathway. The role is focussed on providing general information/support about cancer and cancer services, to enable people to navigate the health and social care system and make choices that are best for their cancer and their life before, during and after treatment.
A key aspect of the role involves daily and direct (e.g. face to face and telephone) communication with patients, relatives, carers, and health and social care professionals. The nature of the communication required is sensitive due to the nature of cancer. Communication in this context requires a high degree of empathy, understanding, diplomacy, honesty and integrity.
You will proactively identify patient and carer needs using knowledge, approved tools/procedures to ensure that people get the right support to meet their needs. Coordinate access to the right information/education resources to support people in making decisions about aspects of their care, enabling independence, and develop a partnership approach to empower the patient and carers.
The role requires use of judgment in responding to the needs of individuals. The level of judgment required relates to identifying the complexity of the situation, providing appropriate advice and escalating to the registered practitioner where appropriate. S/he will undertake both routine and specially identified tasks for which they have been trained/assessed as competent.
Main duties of the job
- This is a patient facing role and is centred on communicating with people affected by cancer, therefore successful candidates must have excellent communication skills, be compassionate and understanding at a time of great emotional need for our patients.
- To have a full understanding of Personalised Care and what was knows as the 'Recovery Package' including Holistic Needs Assessments and personalised care and support plans, Treatment Summaries, Health and Wellbeing information and support and Personalised Stratified Follow up
- Contribute to the holistic needs assessment. To make sure that identified patients will complete the questionnaire and document these accordingly.
- Organise and prioritise the designated workload in relation to identified needs
- Evaluate outcomes of care delivery with the registered practitioner
- Identify indicators of need or changes in need through telephone contact and respond appropriately
- Act as advocate and facilitator to resolve issues that may be perceived as barriers to care
- Support people to access appropriate information and support, by sign-posting to a range of support services and take an approach which helps people to self-manage where appropriate.
- Provide administrative support to enable CNSs to have specialist time to be focused on patients. Support may include making referrals to other agencies or audits.
- Carry out administrative duties required by the role.
- Attend and actively participate in team / group meetings as required.
Working for our organisation
GSTT, as a leading NHS Foundation Trust, and Macmillan, as the country’s leading cancer charity, have formed a ground-breaking partnership which aims to transform cancer care in the UK by researching, developing and promoting new models of care. This partnership commits to ensure that every cancer patient treated at the Trust and their loved ones have access to the best possible care, support and information.
Although directly employed by GSTT, this post is also one of a network of over 8000 Macmillan health and social care roles that Macmillan supports across the UK (known as Macmillan Professionals). Macmillan sees these staff as much a part of Macmillan as any directly employed member of staff. We value and support our professionals, so they can build upon their skills and deliver the best care possible to people affected by cancer.
Being a Macmillan Professional gives you many additional opportunities, such as access to a range of free learning and development, free information resources, support from a range of Macmillan subject experts, as well as access to our UK wide networks of cancer and palliative care specialists. For further information please go to:
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
- Key Relationships
- Clinical Nurse Specialists (CNSs)
- Multi-Disciplinary Teams (MDT),
- Administrative Teams
- Cancer Performance
- Radiotherapy
- Chemotherapy
- Oncology
- Surgical and Palliative Care
- Primary Care teams
- Patients and their carers
- Macmillan Cancer Support, including Macmillan Information and Support Services
- National Cancer Information Service
- Voluntary sector groups
- Duties and Responsibilities
- Provide a point of contact for patients throughout their treatment
- Responsible for contacting and organising appointments and information and results
- Coordinate face to face appointments as per MDT instructions
- Support and contribute to audit processes, governance, research, clinical research trials and service development
- Report any protocol variance to MDT and CNS
- Responsible for validation and updating of database(s)
- Support the planning/inviting/organising of informative events for patients
- Document and monitor all aspects of care coordination and service delivery, supporting data collection for audit
- Demonstrate the ability to recognise and respond appropriately when faced with a sudden deterioration or an emergency situation, alerting the team or enabling rapid response as appropriate
- Under the guidance and supervision of a registered practitioner:
- Coordinate the follow up investigations required post cancer diagnosis or treatment
- Support the delivery of Cancer Waiting Times (CWT) through effective pathway monitoring
- Coordinate a rapid re-entry into the specialist cancer team review as per tumour group protocol
- Develop and maintain a good professional relationship with patients and with the specialist cancer teams
- Communicate appropriate needs related information
- Facilitate access to health and well-being services, and other support services
- Provide basic telephone advice and refer on or sign-post to other sources of support
- Facilitate access to third sector support, e.g. Macmillan Information Services, HOPE programme
- Be a single point of contact for patients, their carers and GPs/Primary Care for patients whilst they remain cancer patients at the Trust
- Support patients and carers to access up-to-date and appropriate information, including sign posting to a range of support services
- Support the direction of the patient or carer to education or support areas. Encourage and support active and healthy lifestyle choices
- Support patients and carers to understand what signs, symptoms or situations to be aware of that would indicate concern
- Inform patients and carers on how to make contact when they feel that their condition or needs have changed, including what to do out of hours
- Support the delivery of patient and carer training and education.
- Planning/inviting/organising of Health and Well-Being events or other supported self-management events.
- To attend allocated Health & Well Being events, keeping comprehensive electronic records of attendance.
- Encourage and support active and healthy lifestyle choices
- Coach patients and carers on how to make contact when they feel that their condition or needs have changed, including what to do out of hours
- This is a patient facing role and is centred on communicating with people affected by cancer, therefore successful candidates must have excellent communication skills, be compassionate and understanding at a time of great emotional need for our patients.
- To have a full understanding of Personalised Care and what was knows as the 'Recovery Package' including Holistic Needs Assessments and personalised care and support plans, Treatment Summaries, Health and Wellbeing information and support and Personalised Stratified Follow up
- Contribute to the holistic needs assessment. To make sure that identified patients will complete the questionnaire and document these accordingly.
- Organise and prioritise the designated workload in relation to identified needs
- Evaluate outcomes of care delivery with the registered practitioner
- Coordinate and organise appointments and assessments as required
- Identify indicators of need or changes in need through telephone contact and respond appropriately
- Act as advocate and facilitator to resolve issues that may be perceived as barriers to care
- Support people to access appropriate information and support, by sign-posting to a range of support services and take an approach which helps people to self-manage where appropriate.
- Provide administrative support to enable CNSs to have specialist time to be focused on patients. Support may include making referrals to other agencies or audits such as patient experience surveys etc.
- Carry out administrative duties required by the role such as organising meetings, taking minutes, producing documentation and organizing supplies
- Offer suggestions for improvement of service
- Ensure that all daily tasks and on-going workloads are prioritized and completed within agreed timeframes.
- Demonstrate insight into own professional development, contributing to the process of identifying own educational and training needs in conjunction with line manager.
- Attend and actively participate in team / group meetings as required.
- Support and contribute to audit processes, governance, research, clinical research trials and service development
Person specification
Qualifications
Essential criteria
- Comprehensive secondary education with a minimum of 5 GCSE’s
- Educated to diploma level or NVQ 3, City and Guilds certificate level in business administration or equivalent
- Evidence of some formal further training in short courses, experience of a range of admin practices and significant experience of hospital administration
Desirable criteria
- Evidence of further education
- Customer services qualification / training
- IT package qualification / training e.g. European Computer Driving Licence (ECD)
- Counselling, Psychology or Mental Health qualification e.g. Counselling Diploma or Level 3 RQF Understanding Mental Health
Previous experience
Essential criteria
- Significant proven experience of delivering to high standards in a fast-paced high volume customer care environment
- Ability to deal with a range of issues independently and efficiently
- Proven administrative experience
Desirable criteria
- Experience of an administrative role with the NHS
- Experience of supervising staff
- Experience of working across organisational boundaries
- Experience of working with IT Healthcare Systems, e.g. PIMS, CIS, EPR, EPIC
- Customer Services experience
Skills
Essential criteria
- Excellent interpersonal skills with the ability to liaise effectively with a wide range of multi- disciplinary staff
- Able to communicate contentious / sensitive information to service users and internal colleagues
- Ability to work both autonomously and in a team
- Ability to work with confidential data and information and deal with sensitive issues discreetly
- Organisational and time management skills to meet deadlines
- Strong IT skills, particularly with relation to Microsoft Office packages, e.g. Word, Outlook and Excel
Desirable criteria
- Knowledge of cancer /medical terminology
- Knowledge and understanding of Personalised Care previously knows as the Recovery Package
Employer certification / accreditation badges
Applicant requirements
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.
Documents to download
Further details / informal visits contact
- Name
- Liz Graham
- Job title
- Macmillan Personalised Cancer Care Lead
- Email address
- [email protected]
- Telephone number
- 07926075686
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