Junior Sister/Charge Nurse, Assessment Unit

NHS; Redditch; On-site; GBP 30,000 - 40,000; Full time

Job summary

A prominent healthcare trust in Redditch is seeking a Junior Sister/Charge Nurse for the Assessment Unit. The successful candidate will lead a team to ensure high-quality nursing care, mentor junior staff, and manage patient pathways. This permanent role requires strong leadership skills, experience in an acute setting, and a commitment to patient-centered care. The trust values flexible working and strives to deliver the best services to the local community.

Benefits

Flexible working opportunities

Competitive salary

Qualifications

• Registered Nurse with a valid pin number.
• At least 2 years of experience in acute medicine.
• Ability to use clinical judgement effectively.

Responsibilities

• Lead clinical staff in providing patient care.
• Facilitate effective communication within multidisciplinary teams.
• Oversee patient admission, transfer, and discharge processes.

Skills

Clinical judgment

Teaching and assessing

Infection control procedures

Patient care pathway development

Education

Registered Nurse qualification

Tools

IV therapy

Venepuncture and Cannulation

Job description

Junior Sister/Charge Nurse, Assessment Unit

The closing date is 14 December 2025

We currently have a vacancy for band 6 Sister AMU. As a Sister/Charge Nurse you will help lead the unit so that high quality, evidence based nursing care is delivered to our patients. You will provide strong leadership and mentor junior staff while you help support the senior team at a time of great change. You will be a highly visible leader and be experienced as a professional role model. In working in a progressively changing environment you will promote the Trust’s values and be committed to high standards of service delivery alongside helping to achieve Trust and national standards and targets. The post is permanent & full time.

Main duties of the job

• Establish and maintain effective communication and foster good working relationships with all multidisciplinary teams, both internal and external.
• Provide and receive complex and/or sensitive information from patients and staff. For example, breaking bad news to patients, giving complex information about procedures and their outcomes, dealing with performance issues, holding staff meetings. Able to support and talk to distressed patients, visitors, and staff members.
• Responsible for cascading information to ward staff and chairing staff meetings from which minutes are provided.
• Make use of electronic internal/external mail and Internet systems as appropriate and necessary.
• Deal effectively with comments, complaints, or incidents that affect staff and users of the ward in accordance with complaints, risk management, or human resources procedures.
• Bring to the attention of the Senior Sister/Charge any factors which may adversely affect patient care or service provision.
• Report all serious incidents to the appropriate Manager/Director within 24 hours; these include Never Events, serious falls, and grade 3 or 4 pressure ulcers.

About us

Our purpose is simple – Putting Patients First. We are looking for exceptional colleagues who can help achieve this.

Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust is a large acute and specialised hospital trust that provides a range of local acute services to the residents of Worcestershire and more specialised services to a larger population in Herefordshire and beyond.

The Trust operates hospital-based services from three sites in Kidderminster, Redditch and Worcester.

Our workforce is nearly 6,800 strong, and our caring staff are recognised as providing good and outstanding patient-centred care. You could be one of them.

We are committed to recruiting the best people to work with us to achieve our Vision – working in partnership to provide the best healthcare for our communities, leading and supporting our teams to move 4ward. Our 4ward behaviours, which we ask all staff to demonstrate, underpin our everyday work and remain firmly at the heart of all we do.

Our objectives are simple:

• Best services for local people
• Best experience of care and best outcomes for our patients
• Best use of resources
• Best people

Better never stops, and our Clinical Services Strategy provides a clear future vision for our Trust, our hospitals, our services and our role in the wider health and care system.

We are proud to have achieved Timewise accreditation – this means we are committed to embedding flexible working within our organisation as a flex positive employer.

Job responsibilities

Job Purpose: To act as team leader for clinical staff.

Key duties:

• Operational responsibilities – Establish and maintain effective communication and foster good working relationships with all multidisciplinary teams, both internal and external.
• Provide and receive complex and/or sensitive information from patients and staff…
• Responsible for cascading information to ward staff and chairing staff meetings…
• Make use of electronic internal/external mail and Internet systems…
• Deal effectively with comments, complaints, or incidents…
• Bring to the attention of the Senior Sister/Charge any factors…
• Report all serious incidents to the appropriate Manager/Director within 24 hours…

Knowledge, skills & experience (Also see Person Specification)

• Be knowledgeable about the specific care requirements of patients who may be admitted to the area.
• Be knowledgeable about current infection control procedures and policies and ensure all staff and visitors adhere to these at all times.
• Be knowledgeable about the risks of infection and take responsibility for minimising cross infection within the clinical environment, assist in giving information and placing patients appropriately.
• Be knowledgeable about all aspects of diabetes care.
• Ensure that patient care is evidence based and that the patients journey is streamlined. Develop and implement patient pathways as directed.
• Use a wide range of knowledge in determining at the time of assessment or admission, the most appropriate and safe patient pathway.
• Identify, assess, and act accordingly at any point on the pathway including discharge when patients are no longer meeting the agreed appropriate and safe patient pathway.
• Assess and act upon potential problems or issues to ensure a safe, effective environment for staff, patients, and visitors.
• Identify, analyse, and act upon staff situation when there is conflict and/or deviation from Trust or local policies and procedures.
• Identify, analyse, action and discuss with Senior Sister/ Charge Nurse as appropriate any change management issues that arise.

Planning and organisational skills

• Assist in planning of duty rotas or alter planned rotas to ensure maximum service delivery, standards of patient care and human, and resource management. Use e-rostering as it becomes available.
• Assist Senior Sister / Charge Nurse by utilising available resources to ensure safe and effective patient care e.g. periods of unplanned staff absence and / or equipment failure.
• Be aware of Trust financial position and target objectives and ensure that ward area is as effective as possible in meeting these objectives.
• Work with the multi-disciplinary team to streamline care and shorten patient length of stay.
• Work with the multi-disciplinary team towards protocol led discharge for suitable patients.
• Participate in Directorate / Departmental Sisters meetings.
• Be involved in practice development and patient experience issues.

Responsibilities for patient care, therapy & treatment

• Oversee set patient care programmes in accordance with agreed policies, using expert nursing experience and skills.
• Ensure that safe and effective nursing care is delivered, this to be in accordance with Trust policies and best practice guidelines, also Nursing & Midwifery Council (NMC) Codes of Practice and guidelines.
• Act as a role model when carrying out and demonstrating nursing care and procedures.
• Ensure all staff carry out all appropriate general risk assessments within 24 hours of admission document and plan care accordingly e.g. manual handling, pressure risks, slips trips and falls, nutrition.
• Ensure clinical staff assess the conditions of patients within the clinical area, ensuring that signs and symptoms are acted upon accordingly and in a timely fashion.
• Ensure clinical area staff effectively manage the admission, transfer, and discharge of patients while incorporating other relevant Trust policies, for example Patients Property.
• Ensure clinical area staff carry out appropriate nutritional risk assessments and follow current policies as indicated e.g. redtray policy, protected mealtimes.
• Ensure clinical area staff participate in delivery of meals to patients and take responsibility for monitoring and recording dietary and fluid intake for group of patients.
• Undertake nurse led services which will include autonomous nurse led discharge within defined protocols where appropriate.
• Supervision of, and participation in the discharge planning system and process and deal with speciality or complex plans of care by liaison with community nursing services and other agencies.
• Work with patients, carers/ relatives, nursing and other healthcare professionals in secondary care to promote timely discharge, through appropriate discharge planning.
• Provide telephone advice to patients and/or their carers as appropriate.
• Provide expert advice and support to colleagues in the care and management of patients within specialty.
• Actively contribute to the health and wellbeing of patients by promoting health through a number of methods e.g. healthy eating, exercise and smoking cessation.
• Ensure accurate, comprehensive contemporaneous and clear documentation of patients care.
• Ensure that own and others written reports are in accordance with Trust policy and NMC guidelines.
• Be familiar with the policy for safe administration of prescribed therapies, including Medicines Management, Intravenous Therapy, Patient Group Directives, clinical guidelines for example Diabetes, Warfarin.
• Demonstrate the ability to safely monitor and provide care for the patient once therapies have been administered.
• Assist Senior Sister in ensuring audit documentation is kept up to date and collated as required. To include all the current audits for the KPI and CQuins such as timely nutrition assessments, pressure ulcer prevalence, numbers of slips, trips and fall etc.
• Recommend any necessary policy changes following audit by discussion with Senior Sister / Charge Nurse and once agreed to ensure their implementation.
• Assist Senior Sister / Charge Nurse in ensuring that staff participate in agreed research to benefit the department's development and patient care.
• Support the Senior Sister / Charge Nurse by providing regular reports on standards of cleanliness, quality of food provided for patients and staff, essence of care standards.
• Act as a senior and experienced nursing opinion in initiatives / policy decisions taking.

Vision and values

The Trust aims to provide local services for local people. It has developed its vision to reflect this commitment.

To continue to be the major provider of acute/specialist services for the people of Worcestershire (and wider) with a strong reputation for providing outstanding, high quality, reliable, accessible and integrated healthcare for local people.

Person Specification

• Registered pin number
• Teaching and Assessing qualification
• IV therapy trained
• Venepuncture and Cannulation trained
• Good clinical knowledge
• Able to use clinical judgement
• Awareness of Professional Development Reviews
• Have at least 2 years experience working in an acute medicine
• Awareness of sickness absence/monitoring
• Complaints handling using Essence of Care standards

Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust