Antenatal and Newborn Screening Specialist Midwife

Job overview

This is an exciting opportunity for an experienced band 6 midwife to join the Antenatal and Newborn Screening Team. The successful applicant will join our team of specialist midwives to ensure that the National Antenatal and Newborn Screening Programmes are delivered safely and efficiently.

As a team, we work closely with NHS England's regional screening and immunisation teams and also support the maternal and neonatal immunisation service within our organisation. In addition, this role requires the individual to work with the wider multidisciplinary team  including specialist services such as fetal medicine, sexual health, gastroenterology and tertiary Fetal Medicine and Genetic counselling services.

Main duties of the job

Key Responsibilities

• Support the Screening Coordinator:

Provide comprehensive support to the Antenatal and Newborn Screening Coordinator in the day-to-day management of screening services.

• Counselling:

Counsel women and couples who have received an increased chance screening result, particularly for infectious diseases like HIV, Syphilis, and Hepatitis B, and for suspected fetal abnormalities.

• Audit and Monitoring:

Participate in audits to assess the effectiveness of screening programmes and contribute to reports for monitoring against national standards and NHS England.

• Education and Development:

Act as a link midwife, providing expertise and education in specific areas of antenatal and newborn screening.

• Data Management:

Assist with managing screening data, using computer literacy to handle statistics, and contributing to business planning for service development.

• In-depth understanding of antenatal and newborn screening programmes in the UK, with specific knowledge of infectious disease screening protocols.
• Clinical Expertise:

Demonstrate a strong commitment to normal midwifery practices while also managing complex screening results.

• Communication Skills:

Excellent communication skills to interact with women, families, and the multidisciplinary team.

• Data Proficiency:

Competence in managing data and spreadsheets for audit and service improvement.

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Detailed job description and main responsibilities

The main duties of this role are to support the Antenatal Screening Coordinator and specialist midwives to deliver the NHSE Antenatal and Newborn screening programmes.  The team deal with a range of issues including:

• Supporting women to discuss and make choices during pregnancy when there are additional concerns.
• Counselling women and couples regarding high chance screening results.
• Coordinating care for women with positive infectious disease screening results, HIV, Syphilis and Hepatitis B.
• Supporting parents and coordinating multidisciplinary care for babies with known fetal abnormalities and babies with suspected chromosomal abnormalities, including supporting parents through their decision to continue or terminate a pregnancy.
• Capture and maintain extensive data which is required to track our population and monitor performance in line with national standards.
• The role also will include:
• Participation in the audit and monitoring of the screening programmes and participation in the delivery of in-service training.
• Supporting Women and their Families with screen positive results.
• Acting as a professional support to midwives and midwifery support workers in effective delivery of the screening programmes.
• Responding to adverse events within the screening programmes; participation in investigation or risk.
• Participation in the regional and local Screening Programme meetings.