Clinical Specialist Occupational Therapist – Critical Care

Job overview

The Royal London Hospital (RLH) is a leading trauma centre, and tertiary centre for neurosciences, renal, hepato-biliary medicine and vascular surgery. The adult critical care unit (ACCU) is 56 bedded, with a large cohort of major trauma, surgery, and medicine admissions providing Level 2/3 care, including to our established elective surgical HDU.

An exciting new opportunity has arisen for a motivated and experienced Occupational Therapist to join the ACCU senior leadership team to provide strong clinical and operational leadership. As a new post, the candidate will develop and deliver a high-quality occupational therapy service to the unit, whilst also managing a complex caseload. The candidate must have excellent clinical skills across a broad range of specialities to manage the complex cohort collaboratively with the wider multi-disciplinary team including cognitive rehabilitation, complex seating assessments, and upper limb management.

You will participate in our established complex patient multidisciplinary meetings and delirium ward rounds. This post will be working closely with the Clinical Lead Physiotherapist / Speech therapist / Dietician and established physiotherapy service to provide a ringfenced critical care rehabilitation service across a 7-day service and includes weekend working alongside the physiotherapy team. The post holder will also join the Occupational Therapy Professional Network providing collective leadership for OTs.

Main duties of the job

This is a pioneering role, ideal for a forward-thinking and clinically expert Occupational Therapist with a passion for critical care and service transformation. You will play a central role in shaping how Occupational Therapy is delivered across our major trauma, surgical, and medical critical care units — areas where early, specialist rehabilitation is key to improving patient outcomes and reducing length of stay.

As the founding clinical specialist, you will be responsible for establishing clinical pathways, embedding Occupational Therapy within the multi-disciplinary team, and advocating for the profession at all levels of care. You will work closely with therapy leads, critical care consultants, and operational teams to define the scope of the service, create clinical documentation and outcome measures, and develop referral and triage processes tailored to this complex patient group. Alongside your clinical responsibilities, you will contribute to the strategic vision for Occupational Therapy within the hospital, supporting the Associate Director of Therapies and Deputy Head of Therapies in aligning this new service with Trust priorities around rehabilitation, patient flow, and recovery after critical illness. You will lead on quality improvement initiatives, service evaluation, and championing the use of data and research to drive best practice.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

The full job description provides an overview of the key tasks and responsibilities of the role, and the person specification outlines the qualifications, skills, experience, and knowledge required. For both documents, please view the attachment/s below.