Healthcare Assistant

Gateshead Health; Gateshead; Hybrid; GBP 21,000 - 25,000; Full time

Job summary

Gateshead Health NHS Foundation Trust in Gateshead is seeking a Healthcare Assistant for the Critical Care Department at Queen Elizabeth Hospital to help provide high quality, compassionate patient care. This permanent role requires flexibility to rotate across day and night shifts on a 7‑day service and to work closely with the nursing team and MDT.

The post involves direct patient care, communication with families, and supporting clinical tasks under supervision.

Qualifications

• Maths and English qualification or equivalent.
• Willingness to attend training and development opportunities.
• Experience of working with people in a healthcare setting.
• Experience in supporting unwell patients.
• Vocational qualification in health and social care (e.g. care certificate; level 2/3 diploma).

Responsibilities

• Undertakes a range of delegated clinical care duties within department.
• Undertakes a range of hotel type service tasks within department.
• Demonstrate effective communication with patients, relatives, staff and the wider MDT.
• Using appropriate assessment tools under supervision to assist the registered nurse in assessment of the patients health and well being needs.
• Initiate emergency action when required e.g cardiac arrest, fire.
• Promote personal hygiene and physical health; support activities of daily living.

Skills

Communication

Teamwork

Caring and Compassionate

Computer literacy

Education

Maths and English qualification

Job description

An exciting permanent opportunity has come up for a Healthcare Assistant in the Critical Care Department, Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

We are looking for caring and compassionate individuals, who can prioritise delivering high quality and safe patient care, to join our team.

We are keen to hear from individuals who are hard working, reliable and passionate in making a difference to our patients.

We will consider full time and part time hours, this will be a rotation of day and night shift covering a 7 day service.

Main duties of the job

People who use our services are from diverse backgrounds with a wide range of needs which may include long term conditions, mental health conditions, learning disabilities or dementia.

As a healthcare assistant you will be working closely with individuals, assisting the nursing staff and multi-disciplinary team to provide high quality care to patients.

• Undertakes a range of delegated clinical care duties within department
• Undertakes a range of hotel type service tasks within department
• Demonstrate effective communication with patients, relatives, staff and the wider MDT

About us

Based in the North East of England we provide a range of hospital and community health services from our leading facilities, including the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Blaydon urgent care centre and Bensham Hospital, all within Gateshead.

Established in 2005, we were one of the first foundation trusts in the country and since then have consistently achieved the highest levels of care for patients.

We now employ around 4,800 staff and currently provide 444 hospital beds across the Gateshead region.

Our values should be the 'golden thread' which runs through everything we do - they are the core of who we are. Our five values can easily be remembered by the simple acronymICORE; Innovation, Care, Openness, Respect, Engagement.

We have a number of staff networks including the Global Ethnic Majority (GEM) network, D-Ability network, LGBTQ+ Network and the Women's Network, to challenge us and help us to constantly improve. Our Armed Forces network is one of our emerging networks.

The health and wellbeing of our staff is one of our highest priorities, and we offer a range of support and initiatives as part of our 'Balance' programme balancegateshead.com to cater for our diverse workforce, so that your individual needs can be supported, allowing you a happy and healthy working experience with us.

Job responsibilities

• Key responsibilities
  • To abide by trust policies and procedures.
  • Build and maintain safe and effective therapeutic relationships.
  • Support individuals to contribute to collaborative care/support/recovery plans.
  • Support the named nurse to develop collaborative individual, patient centred care plans and implement them creatively using initiative.
  • Communicate effectively with a wide range of people using a range of preferred methods.
  • Contribute to monitoring, observing and engaging with individuals, communicating outcomes and conclusions with the rest of the team.
  • Gain an understanding of a persons experiences in relation to their mental health, learning disability, dementia and/ or delirium.
  • Understand a persons coping strategies and strengths and support people to use these at times of distress or difficulty.
  • Be able to recognise increasing risk and alert significant others and the team to respond as needed.
  • Undertake a range of practical tasks and duties in support of the team and individual needs.
  • To feel confident to be able to report untoward incidents and areas of concern as soon as they arise.
  • Contribute to individual reviews and team meetings.
• Duties
  • Using appropriate assessment tools under supervision to assist the registered nurse in assessment of the patients health and well being needs.
  • Initiate emergency action when required e.g cardiac arrest, fire
  • Identify/contribute to their own goals to improve their quality of life
  • Participate in clinical skills as trained in line with role e.g recording ECGs
  • Support individuals to express their needs and wishes
  • Promote their personal hygiene and physical health.
  • Actively engage in health promotion
  • Assist individuals with activities of daily living encouraging active participation and independence
• Training and Supervision
  • Undertake mandatory and appropriate training relevant to your role for example:
  • Identify own training and developmental needs
  • Identify areas of training need that are relevant to the team
  • Assist in the delivery of training in areas of personal experience and interest.
  • Participate in regular individual and group supervision
  • Participate in the development of the service
• Personal responsibilities
  • Ensure that people are treated with dignity and respect
  • Promote anti-discriminatory activities
  • Work flexibly to meet service needs
• Administrative responsibilities
  • Keep clinical records up to date using trust systems in accordance with legislation as delegated by the nurse in charge
  • Maintain records to a high standard and record activity data in a timely manner
• Professional responsibilities
  • Maintain confidentiality of all personal information and data in line with organisational policy.
  • Be familiar and work in line with local and national policy and procedures.
  • Raise concern in regard to disciplinary or performance issues to the management team using policies and procedures such as safeguarding and Freedom to speak up.

This job description is not intended to be exhaustive. The post holder, will therefore, be expected to adopt a flexible attitude towards these duties which may (after discussion) must be varied, subject to the needs of the department and in keeping with the general profile of the post.

Qualifications and Training

• Maths and English qualification or equivalent
• Vocational qualification in health and social care (e.g. care certificate; level 2/3 diploma)
• Willingness to attend training and development opportunities

Skills and Knowledge

• Good Communication, Interpersonal and Organisational Skills
• Team Working
• Caring and Compassionate
• Computer Literacy

Experience

• Experience of working with people in a healthcare setting
• Experience in supporting unwell patients

Special Requirements

• Ability to work flexibly as service needs dictate
• Work a rotation of day and night shifts

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.