Medical Secretary, Cardiology, Band 3

Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust; Gloucestershire Science & Technology Park; On-site; GBP 24,000 - 27,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading healthcare provider in Gloucestershire is seeking a Medical Secretary for a 12-month fixed term position. The role involves providing comprehensive secretarial support to the Cardiology team, ensuring high-quality communication with patients and medical staff. Candidates should have GCSEs in literacy and numeracy, plus relevant secretarial qualifications. This position offers a competitive salary range of £24,937 to £26,598 per annum, with 37.5 hours of work each week.

Qualifications

• Experience of working as a secretary in a medical environment.
• Demonstrable experience of speed typing (min 60 wpm).
• Understanding of medical terminology.

Responsibilities

• Provide an efficient secretarial service to the Cardiology team.
• Ensure excellent communication with patients and staff.
• Manage clinic schedules and communicate capacity issues effectively.

Skills

Communication skills

Organisational skills

Time management

Education

GCSE grade C in literacy and numeracy

RSA Level three/Speed typing qualification

NVQ level three in administration

Tools

Microsoft Office packages

Job description

Medical Secretary, Cardiology, Band 3

The closing date is 05 January 2026

A 12-month fixed term position at 37.5 hours a week

The post-holder will provide an efficient, confidential and professional secretarial service to a consultant and their supporting team. This will include administration and secretarial support to enable provision of patient care and specialty services. Good communication with patients, relatives, general practitioners and other hospital staff is essential to ensure a proficient, high‑quality service for patients and clinicians. The post-holder will be expected to work as part of the Cardiology team and also support the wider secretarial team as needed.

Main duties of the job

• Providing a comprehensive secretarial and administrative service to the medical staff and their supporting team.
• Providing cover for colleagues in their absence to maintain service levels.
• Ensuring excellent communication is provided to patients, relatives, general practitioners and other hospital staff to ensure a proficient, high‑quality service for patients and clinicians.
• Ensuring all clinics are used to their full capacity and that any vacant slots are fully utilised and acted upon, including informing the Booking Office, to maximise capacity.
• Regularly informing the secretarial supervisor about progress and flagging up as a matter of urgency any issues, for example, capacity or delays due to internal or external factors, difficult queries from patients, etc.
• Carrying out regular review and administrative validation of the clinician's return outpatient wait list.
• Supporting the achievement of Trust performance by ensuring administrative standards are met e.g., typing times, test results passed to clinician and any potential 52‑week breaches are escalated to the clinician, secretarial supervisor or AGM/DGM to avoid breach.
• Ensuring all clinic cancellations/alterations are dealt with efficiently and in line with the Trust's 8‑week annual/study leave policy.

About us

Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust provides acute hospital services from two large district general hospitals, Cheltenham General Hospital and Gloucestershire Royal Hospital. Maternity Services are also provided at Stroud Maternity Hospital. We remain the major provider of secondary care services in the area and analysis shows that for Gloucestershire we are the leading acute healthcare provider by a significant margin.

At Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, our patients are at the heart of everything we do, and pivotal to this are our Secretarial and Administration Teams, whose dedication, expertise and kindness ensures that patients receive the very best care throughout their pathway through our services. I wish you every success with your application to join this team.

Job responsibilities

• Typing correspondence to patients, GPs, medical staff and any other required addressee following clinical attendance or other patient contacts using digital dictation or via Dragon voice recognition.
• Typing detailed medical reports when necessary.
• Take and transcribe minutes as appropriate.
• Highlighting to the clinical team members any results, correspondence or patient queries that need response and taking action e.g. booking investigations, transcription, etc.
• Ensuring incoming post and results is sorted, any appropriate action taken and passed to the clinician on a daily basis.
• Ensuring that any vacant slots are fully utilised and acted upon, including informing the Booking Office, to maximise capacity.
• Deal with enquiries by letter/e‑mail/telephone from patients, GPs, other hospitals, police, solicitors (via legal department), other consultants and management.
• Origination of procedures in negotiation with the clinical staff and patients as requested by the secretary supervisor. This includes identifying potential dates with the clinical team, negotiation of dates with the patient and any additional co‑ordination of staff, equipment, stock, facilities, external support (company representatives) and paperwork.
• Carrying out regular review and administrative validation of the clinician's return outpatient wait list.
• Regularly informing the secretarial supervisor about progress and flagging up as a matter of urgency any issues, for example, capacity or delays due to internal or external factors, difficult queries from patients, etc.
• Liaising with external organisations for the benefit and progress of patient care, such as Social Services, other hospitals, etc.
• Support the development of improvements to working practices and processes and contribute to service reviews and the implementation of new arrangements.
• As directed, support the resolution of complaints or concerns from patients/carers by helping to collate information and work with the supervisor to respond or elevate appropriately.
• To work as part of an Administrative Support Team working flexibly to ensure that administrative work is shared out equally and performed to excellent, efficient and safe standards.
• To cover colleagues during absences/annual/sick leave as directed by the secretary supervisor. You may also be required to undertake job rotation for cross cover as well as for development and training purposes.
• Undertake routine office duties including electronic note tracking, photocopying, faxing, filing of correspondence and results and maintenance of records in the absence of the band 2 clerical assistant.
• Assist in the training and induction for new and existing colleagues. Take initiative as and when required as well as working flexibly and adapting to the demands of the department/team as appropriate.
• Undertake any other appropriate duties commensurate with the role, as required at the request of your line manager.

Person Specification

Qualifications

• Educated to GCSE grade C or above (or equivalent) in literacy and numeracy.
• RSA Level three/Speed typing qualification or demonstrable experience (min 60 wpm).
• NVQ level three in administration or equivalent experience appropriate experience in a hospital or office environment.

Experience

• Experience of working as a secretary.
• IT experience of Microsoft Office packages.
• IT capable to ensure proficient use of hospital computer systems.
• Appropriate experience in a hospital or office environment.
• Understanding and previous experience in medical terminology.

Knowledge / Skills

• Able to prioritise own workload and that of others as appropriate.
• Personally resilient and able to manage complexity and work in an ambiguous or changing environment.
• Excellent presentational, communication and interpersonal skills.
• Good command and understanding of English, punctuation and grammar.
• Proven organisational skills.
• Able to take accurate and clear minutes of meetings and distribute them promptly.
• Knowledge and awareness of health and safety issues, risk management, and data protection act.

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.

Employer name

Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

£24,937 to £26,598 a year (pa, pro rata if part-time)