Consultant in Paediatric Infectious Diseases (ID) & Immunology

Job overview

The Paediatric Infectious Diseases and Immunology service was established in 2005 and provides an outpatient and inpatient consulting service within the Trust and a daily bacteraemia and advice ward round. There are several specialist multidisciplinary team meetings each week and excellent, collaborative relationships across the specialist medical and surgical teams in the hospital.

The team sees approximately 1,000 ward consults, 700 outpatients and 400 day cases or ward attenders per year. We work closely with microbiology, infection prevention & control and allied services each with dedicated nurse specialists in antimicrobial stewardship (AMS), outpatient parenteral antimicrobial therapy (OPAT), sepsis and vascular access. Alder Hey is approved as a subspecialty training centre for paediatric infectious diseases and is nationally commissioned for highly specialised services. This job is for a full time (10 PA) Consultant post to join the Paediatric Infectious Diseases and Immunology service in one of the largest children’s hospitals in Europe, Alder Hey Children’s NHS Foundation Trust. The successful applicant will provide and support an outpatient and inpatient consulting service within the Trust and will work with clinical and laboratory colleagues (NHS and academic) both within the Trust and outside.

Main duties of the job

The successful applicant will participate in all aspects of the clinical inpatient ID/Immunology consult service and AMS/OPAT service on a rotational basis with consultant colleagues. The successful applicant will be expected to give advice on treating infection in inpatients through ward rounds and multidisciplinary meetings. They will also be able to contribute to the TB and HIV services and the inpatient care of immunology patients and the supervision of inpatient immunisations. The candidate will be expected to participate in teaching activities with medical students and trainee doctors and engage in quality improvement activities within the Trust.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Clinical Inpatient work The team receives referrals from across the hospital for advice on investigation and management of infection and immunology-related problems. We also receive referrals from the AMS team and directly from the microbiology laboratory. We work very closely with the on-site microbiology laboratory and have a review of positive cultures every morning with a Consultant microbiologist and laboratory staff before beginning rounds. Requests for advice are also received from hospitals around the region. A specialist HIV/immunology nurse with advanced clinical skills co-ordinates the care of our hepatitis, HIV and immunodeficiency patients and delivery of home and hospital-based immunoglobulin infusions.

Multidisciplinary working and allied teams The ID/immunology and microbiology teams hold a number of scheduled multidisciplinary team meetings with specialist teams through the working week. These currently include PICU and PHDU twice-weekly, neurosurgery, orthopaedics, neonatal surgery and oncology.