Chief Newborn Hearing Screener

Job overview

Are you ambitious to deliver high-quality, family-friendly care? Can you make a difference to the lives of babies and their families? Newborn Hearing Screening, which is a UKAS accredited service, is looking to recruit a Chief Newborn Hearing Screener to join the team.

As a qualified Newborn Hearing Screener, you will use your clinical skills to support the early detection of hearing loss, alongside your leadership skills to support and assist in management of the service. Sandwell and West Birmingham NHS Trust delivers Newborn Hearing Screening across four acute hospital locations and multiple outpost clinics therefore the post holder will need to be able to travel between sites, so a driving license and access to a car is also essential.

Main duties of the job

As a Chief Screener your role will bring a mix of regular clinical work and leadership/management duties. You will have a signficant role in training and assessing the screening team, including being responsible for training new staff and supporting them to complete the Level 3 Health Screeners Diploma and the External Competency Assessment, as well as undertaking annual competency assessments for existing staff.

You will be able to develop your leadership and management skills, overseeing staff rota's, assisting with sickness absence management and undertaking staff personal development reviews. You will be accessible to help support staff with trouble shooting and day-to-day management queries, escalating any matters to the Head of Newborn Hearing Screening as necessary. You will have a compassionate and respectful approach, which helps sustain an engaged team and boosts team morale.

Other responsibilities include managing maintenance/calibration of equipment, managing relevant screening databases and quality monitoring against national targets. Liasion with maternity/neonatal/audiology/health visitors is essential.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Applicants must have experience of working as a Newborn Hearing Screener within the NHS, as well as experience of training, supervision, administration and IT in a public facing role. Excellent interpersonal, organisational and communication skills are required. A recognised assessors award is desirable, or must be completed upon starting to be able to carry out the required duties.

The post holders main base is City Health Campus but regular visits to sites and off site clinics are required. Our band 5 roles are part of our NHSP management team and act as a lead for named sites on a rotational basis, as well as providing support for other sites as needed. The successful post-holder must therefore be willing and able to travel to all four sites, and clinics, to carry out essential site based duties such as health and safety, environment checks, equipment maintenance, competency assessments and site meetings.  Meetings and trainings are held in various locations, including City Health Campus, Sandwell Health Campus and Midland Metropolitan University Hospital, as well as on some occurring online.

For further information about this post, please see the attached job description and person specification.