Senior Speech & Language Therapist - Community

East Suffolk and North Essex NHS Foundation Trust; Ipswich; On-site; GBP 45,000 - 60,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Flexible working

Generous pension

Training opportunities

NHS discounts

Staff health and wellbeing

Job summary

East Suffolk and North Essex NHS Foundation Trust's Community Speech and Language Therapy service in Ipswich is seeking a senior speech and language therapist to manage adults with swallowing and communication difficulties in community settings and inpatient wards. You will assess, treat and coordinate care while working flexibly with colleagues.

The role includes developing skills in FEES and videofluoroscopy and contributing to MDTs.

Qualifications

• Must be a dysphagia competent clinician.
• Experience with adults with communication and swallowing disorders.
• Able to provide assessment and intervention face-to-face, telephone and via virtual clinics.

Responsibilities

• Independently manage a caseload of adults with acquired communication and swallowing difficulties.
• Provide assessment, therapy and management of patients referred to community SLT service.
• Work across community settings including homes, care homes, hospitals and clinics.
• Collaborate with wider community services and MDT colleagues.
• Prioritise referrals in line with departmental policies.
• Support student learning and supervision of junior staff.

Skills

Dysphagia competence

Adult communication disorders

Assessment and therapy

Flexible working

Team collaboration

Education

Bachelor's or equivalent in Speech and Language Therapy

Tools

FEES

Videofluoroscopy

Job description

We have an exciting opportunity for a senior speech and language therapist to join our friendly, innovativespeech and language therapy service, based in our community team in East Suffolk. This is a varied role and responsibilities will include assessment, therapy and management for a mixed caseload of people with a range of acquired swallowing and communication difficulties. You will be a dysphagia competent clinician, with experience in working with adults with a range of communication and swallowing disorders, who is willing to work flexibly with colleagues to meet service need. Community SLT is part of a wider, integrated SLT service in East Suffolk which covers a broad range of clinical specialisms, including aphasia, dysphagia, stroke, progressive neurological conditions, dementia, dysfluency, learning disability and ENT. In Ipswich Hospital, we provide inpatient services across all adult wards, including stroke. We also run videofluoroscopy and FEES clinics for both inpatients and community patients, with opportunities to gain competencies in these assessment techniques. Our outpatient therapists operate as core members of the Head and Neck MDT and ENT services. In the community, we work closely with our MDT colleagues, particularly in relation to the stroke ESD service, and services for people with MND and progressive neurological conditions. We also host a countywide service for adults with learning disability.

Main duties of the job

• To independently manage a caseload of adults with acquired communication and swallowing difficulties.
• To provide assessment, therapy and management of patients referred to the community SLT service for East Suffolk.
• To provide assessment and intervention face to face, over the telephone and by virtual clinics.
• The post holder will be based in the community, working in people's own homes, care homes, community hospitals, as well as the clinic base.
• To work collaboratively with wider community services/Alliance partners to support care pathway for people with communication and swallowing difficulties.
• To prioritise referrals into the community service, in line with Departmental policies and procedures.
• To contribute to the provision and assessment of students on clinical placement including SLT students and wider MDT professions.
• To support student learning, and provide support to junior staff.

We are ESNEFT and we provide hospital and community health services to almost one million people across east Suffolk and north Essex. Our dedicated staff deliver care from acute hospitals in Colchester and Ipswich, community hospitals, surgeries, community clinics and in patients' own homes. We are one of the largest NHS organisations in England, employing more than 12,000 staff.

Benefits

• We pride ourselves on supporting our staff.
• We offer a wide range of training and development opportunities, as well as flexible working options.
• Along with supporting you to achieve your career goals we offer a generous pension scheme, unsocial hours payments (where applicable), 27 days annual leave on commencement (pro rata) and access to a range of NHS discounts.
• Our Staff Health and Wellbeing programme offer a variety of services.
• Our philosophy is that Time Matters to everyone.
• Across the Trust, we concentrate on improving the things we do and removing those which cause time delays for our staff and patients.
• We are investing in our commitment to Time Matters with a partnership with leading electronic patient record (EPR) supplier Epic.
• This digital transformation will bring what's widely regarded as the world's best EPR system to ESNEFT, transforming life in hospital for staff and patients.

If you are passionate about patient care and want to develop your skills and knowledge, then we want to hear from you.