Clinical Lead Dietitian

Job overview

Due to a period of parental leave, we are able to offer this fixed term opportunity to a dietitian with leadership and management skills. You will be based in our Healthy Living Service, which covers both community and inpatients.

We are seeking an enthusiastic, experienced and highly motivated Dietitian to join our Dietetics Service as a Band 7 Clinical Lead Dietitian supporting Mental Health and Older People's Services across Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust.

This is an exciting opportunity for an experienced Band 6 or existing Band 7 Dietitian looking to further develop their clinical leadership skills within a diverse and rewarding specialist area. You will provide professional leadership, expert clinical support, supervision and operational oversight to a team of Dietitians working across inpatient and community mental health services.

The successful candidate will play a pivotal role in supporting service delivery, workforce development and clinical governance whilst maintaining a specialist clinical caseload.

Main duties of the job

As Clinical Lead Dietitian, you will act as the first point of contact for complex clinical issues and provide expert support to Dietitians working across inpatient and community mental health services.

You will work closely with Dietetic Leadership, Allied Health Professional (AHP) leaders, Operational Managers, Matrons and multidisciplinary teams to ensure safe, effective and high-quality nutrition care is delivered across all services.

The role combines clinical expertise, leadership, supervision, and operational coordination.

If you are an experienced Dietitian looking to take the next step in your leadership career, we would love to hear from you.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

To create and adapt temporary pathways for the cover of services whilst there is a gap in dietetic provision and keep the ward teams up to date with these

To facilitate and lead the team with this cover – checking the duty desk, managing caseload, allocating out reviews and referrals. If the role has more time allocated for clinical cover there is more ability to complete more of the remote assessments and reviews to take the pressure off the rest of the team.

You will provide clinical supervision to the band 6 OPS CMHT dietitian and band 6 WAA CMHT dietitian. You will also provide ad hoc support to band 5s for referrals and complex cases with the team. The band 5s require considerable support when starting in the roles with embedding in the teams, and you will need to support with getting them attending the right meetings, how the service runs, the dietetic role, supporting with team dynamics and difficulties embedding etc. As they are the only dietitian in the service they require regular check ins and needs lots of support in the first 6 months.

• Support Dietitians managing complex nutritional presentations, including: Severe malnutrition Enteral feeding patients Nasogastric feeding Eating disorders Complex risk management situations Patients experiencing significant physical health deterioration
• Severe malnutrition
• Enteral feeding patients
• Nasogastric feeding
• Eating disorders
• Complex risk management situations
• Patients experiencing significant physical health deterioration
• Escalate concerns appropriately to Dietetic Leadership, AHP Leadership, Operational Managers and Matrons.
• Attend professional meetings, Care and Treatment Reviews (CTRs) and multidisciplinary discussions to support junior staff.
• Liaise with specialist services including: Acute Trust Diabetes Teams Physical Health In-Reach Services Specialist Dietitians External healthcare providers
• Acute Trust Diabetes Teams
• Physical Health In-Reach Services
• Specialist Dietitians
• External healthcare providers
• Ensure robust and evidence-based clinical practice across services.
• Provide clinical supervision
• Offer ongoing support and coaching to Band 5 Dietitians.
• Support newly appointed staff to embed within multidisciplinary teams.
• Facilitate informal supervision, case discussions and reflective practice.
• Provide support following incidents, adverse events or patient deaths.
• Promote staff wellbeing and resilience.
• Support team cohesion and professional development.
• Coordinate dietetic service provision during staffing gaps.
• Develop and maintain temporary cover arrangements across services.
• Ensure ward teams and stakeholders are informed regarding service changes.
• Monitor referrals and caseloads.
• Manage workload distribution across the team.
• Review and allocate dietetic referrals appropriately.
• Support delivery of remote assessments and reviews where required.
• Ensure equitable and safe allocation of clinical workload.
• Act as the key dietetic link for food provision issues.
• Liaise with Mitie and relevant catering leads to ensure timely resolution of issues.
• Coordinate induction programmes for all new Dietitians joining the team.
• Develop induction timetables and facilitate onboarding.
• Ensure new staff members are integrated into relevant teams and meetings.
• Support competence development, confidence building and professional growth.
• Provide regular check-ins for newly appointed Band 5 Dietitians, particularly during their first six months in post

Applicant requirements

You must have appropriate UK professional registration.

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.