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Job summary

Main area
Old Age
Grade
NHS Medical & Dental: Specialty Doctor
Contract
Permanent
Hours
Full time - 10 sessions per week
Job ref
350-MED6468485
Employer
Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust
Employer type
NHS
Site
Hartley Hospital
Town
Southport
Salary
£52,530 - £82,400 per annum
Salary period
Yearly
Closing
22/08/2024 23:59

Employer heading

Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust logo

Trust Grade Doctor in Old Age Psychiatry

NHS Medical & Dental: Specialty Doctor

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Job overview

As a Specialty Psychiatry Doctor working for Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust you will be responsible for ensuring that our service users’ needs are met through the delivery of high quality care.

 As a member of the outpatient multi-disciplinary team at Hartley Hospital, you will work in a state of the art mental health facility, providing clinical care to older adults who require specialist mental healthcare. You will work closely with a wide range of clinical and professional disciplines in order to deliver holistic care by completing assessments for cognitive impairment and the full range of functional mental disorders. This will provide a wide range of clinical experience to help the post holder to develop their clinical knowledge with a view to possibly taking up a Higher Training post in Older Adults subsequently.

 

 

Main duties of the job

The post holder will be responsible for tasks generated from ward round reviews of inpatients on Dunes ward as well as for assessing, managing and, if necessary, carrying out onward referrals and obtaining medical advice from hospitals for any physical health issues which arise in the inpatients and involves taking a full psychiatric history and collateral history, carrying out physical examination of all systems, obtaining blood samples for laboratory testing and ECG.

The post holder will also be required to prescribe any medications patients are admitted on. They will be supervised by the Consultant Psychiatrist on Dunes ward and will attend all ward rounds and MDT discussions, working closely with the wider MDT on the ward. 

For one day of the week, there will be a responsibility of completing new assessments of service users referred in to the Older Adults community service based at the Hartley Hospital with queries over cognitive impairment. They will conduct diagnostic clinics in which diagnoses are explained and management options discussed.

This will occur under the supervision of Consultant Old Age Psychiatrists based within the service. In addition the post holder will support the team in ensuring that service users’ prescriptions are accurate and updated as well as providing clinical advice. The post holder will be based with the Older Adults service at Hartley Hospital for three days of the week.

 

 

 

Working for our organisation

Mersey Care is one of the largest trusts providing physical health and mental health services in the North West, serving more than 1.4 million people across our region and are also commissioned for services that cover the North West, North Wales and the Midlands.

We offer specialist inpatient and community services that support physical and mental health and specialist inpatient mental health, learning disability, addiction and brain injury services. Mersey Care is one of only three trusts in the UK that offer high secure mental health facilities.

At the heart of all we do is our commitment to ‘perfect care’ – care that is safe, effective, positively experienced, timely, equitable and efficient. We support our staff to do the best job they can and work alongside service users, their families, and carers to design and develop future services together. We’re currently delivering a programme of organisational and service transformation to significantly improve the quality of the services we provide and safely reduce cost as we do so.

Flexible working requests will be considered for all roles.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Dunes ward is a 20 bedded primarily functional older adult complex care ward at the Hartley Hospital in Southport. It caters to functional inpatients from the Southport and Formby areas primarily but also can accept admissions from Liverpool and other areas of the Trust to include Knowsley, St Helens, Warrington and Halton. While the ward is intended for functional patients over the age of 70, several younger adult patients under the age of 70 are admitted to the ward as well.

Hartley Hospital was officially opened by Princess Anne in July 2021. It is a £21 million pound state of the art mental health facility and was named after the local jam-making family and philanthropist Christiana Hartley. It replaces the Boothroyd Unit and Hesketh Centre which previously provided mental health services in the Southport area. The hospital consists of 44 en-suite bedrooms and features inner garden courtyards, a café, two gyms, a family visiting room and multi-faith area. Hartley Hospital takes a lot of features from Mersey Care’s award-winning Clock View Hospital situated in the Walton area of Liverpool.

Dunes ward requires a specialty doctor to work within the multidisciplinary team in an enthusiastic and collaborative manner in order to provide a high quality service for older adult inpatients who require mental and physical health care.

Hartley Hospital accommodates inpatient services for General Adult mental health services in the form of Pine ward which is a 20 bedded mixed adult acute ward.  Community mental health teams for both General Adult and Older Adult services are based upstairs in Hartley Hospital. Irwell ward is a 20 bedded functional older adult ward based at Clock View Hospital in Walton, North Liverpool. Fern ward is a 17 bedded dementia ward based in Leigh Moss Hospital, Liverpool.

There are also well established and fully staffed community mental health teams for older adults in the Trust across the division. Memory Services are also well established. In addition there are well resourced general hospital liaison services for older adults and adults within three acute Hospital Trusts, namely the Royal Liverpool University Hospital, Aintree University Hospital and Southport District Hospital. There are a range of other mental health services provided by Mersey Care including a 2 hour Urgent Community Response service, Armed Forces Community Services, CMAGIC (Cheshire & Merseyside Adult Gender Identity Collaborative), Criminal Justice Liaison & Diversion Service, Drug & Alcohol Services including the Hope Centre which offers inpatient detoxification programs, Learning Disabilities Services, Maternal Mental Health Services including a Specialist Perinatal Service, Mental Health Triage Car Services, a Psychotherapy & Personality Disorder Hub, Student Mental Health Services and The Life Rooms. There are Neuropsychiatry and Acquired Brain Injury Rehabilitation Services based at the Walton Centre on the Aintree University Hospital site.

Foundation Trainees are posted on Dunes ward (1 x F1, 1 x F2 doctor) and are available to complete daily tasks and reviews for the inpatients as well as the postholder.

Inpatient Old Age Psychiatrists:

Dunes Ward, Hartley Hospital, Southport – Dr Sarada Kodali

Irwell Ward, Clock View, Walton, Liverpool – Dr Sumanth Kumar

Fern Ward, Leigh Moss Hospital, Liverpool – Dr Anna Richman

There have been an average of 7.1 new admissions per month over the past eight months in 2024, with an average of 2 per month being for patients under the age of 70. The minimum number of admissions during this time was four and the maximum was 9. During the same period there has been an average of 6.75 discharges per month with the minimum number being 2 and the maximum being 11. Bed occupancy of the ward is usually full (all 20 beds occupied). Over the past six months the average length of stay of patients on Dunes ward is 60 days and the number of discharges from the ward in the same period is 53. In the past six months there have been three patients identified as being delayed discharges, totalling 81 days of delay.

 

Person specification

Qualifications

Essential criteria
  • MB BS or equivalent medical qualification
Desirable criteria
  • MRCPsych or equivalent, MRCGP or equivalent, DGM

Eligibility

Essential criteria
  • Fully registered with the GMC with a licence to practise at the time of appointment
  • In good standing with GMC with respect to warning and conditions on practice
Desirable criteria
  • Section 12 Approval

Clinical Skills, Knowledge & Experience

Essential criteria
  • Excellent knowledge in specialty
  • Minimum 4 years post registration training, 2 of which should be in recognised training programme in psychiatry
  • Excellent clinical skills using bio-psycho-social perspective and wide medical knowledge
  • Excellent oral and written communication skills in English
  • Able to manage clinical complexity and uncertainty
  • Makes decisions based on evidence and experience including the contribution of others
  • Able to meet duties under MHA and MCA
Desirable criteria
  • Wide range of specialist and sub-specialist experience relevant to post within NHS or comparable service

Academic Skills & Lifelong Learning

Essential criteria
  • Able to deliver undergraduate teaching and training
  • Ability to work in and lead team
  • Demonstrate commitment to shared leadership & collaborative working to deliver improvement
  • Participated in continuous professional development
  • Participated in research or service evaluation
  • Able to use and appraise clinical evidence
  • Has actively participated in clinical audit and quality improvement programmes
Desirable criteria
  • Able to plan and deliver undergraduate and postgraduate teaching and training relevant to this post
  • Reflected on purpose of CPD undertaken
  • Experienced in clinical research and / or service evaluation
  • Evidence of achievement in education, research, audit and service improvement: awards, prizes, presentations and publications
  • Has led clinical audits leading to service change or improved outcomes to patients

Employer certification / accreditation badges

Veteran AwareApprenticeships logoNo smoking policyPositive about disabled peopleCare quality commission - GoodArmed Forces Covenant Gold AwardCTP The Ministry of Defence partnering with Right ManagementDisability confident employerCare Leaver CovenantStep into healthArmed Forces Covenant

Applicant requirements

You must have appropriate UK professional registration.

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

Apply online now

Further details / informal visits contact

Name
Dr Andrew Kiridoshi
Job title
Associate Clinical Director
Email address
[email protected]
Telephone number
01928 247100
Additional information

Dr Aravind Komuravelli, Clinical Director, 01925 664126

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