Infection Prevention and Control Site Lead

Job overview

The Infection Prevention and Control Team at East Kent Hospitals University NHS Foundation Trust are looking to recruit a talented and enthusiastic Infection Prevention and Control Site Lead as part of a job share.

This position offers the opportunity for the successful candidate to be a key member of the Infection Prevention and Control Team, interfacing between Care Groups across the Trust, providing expert advice and support and collaborative working with internal and external partners.

We are seeking an experienced specialist, who can jointly lead a team at the William Harvey Hospital, as well as take on  a Trust wide strategic lead role on key IPC issues, supported by the Deputy DIPC and DIPC.

Main duties of the job

The successful candidate will be a dynamic and experienced advanced practitioner with expert knowledge in infection prevention and control, who can support our people in complex decision making.  They will need to be self-motivated and have a flexible approach to work, acting as a role model across disciplines.  They will (jointly)  manage the IPC Nurse Specialists at the William Harvey hospital (as a job share) , and provide clear leadership for infection prevention across the Trust, influencing and improving the quality of care delivered to our patients.

The post will be characterised by the four pillars of practice:

• Clinical Practice
• Leadership
• Facilitating Learning
• Evidence, Research and Development

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Clinical Practice

• To work as a highly specialised member of the team, acting as an expert resource on infection prevention and control issues and provide evidence based infection prevention and control advice to promote best practice.
• To promote the reduction of healthcare associated infection across the Trust, through education, surveillance, audit, policy development/review and innovation.
• To be the (joint)  site lead for ensuring that the Trust Wide Improvement Plan (TWIP) for  Infection Prevention and Control Programme is completed for the site and the wider IPC/Decontamination portfolio as agreed.
• To be visible and accessible to all healthcare staff across all disciplines as an expert specialist resource, guide clinical staff to assess, plan, implement and evaluate care for patients with regard to infection prevention and control.

Communication and Relationship Skills

• Demonstrate a high level of communication and interpersonal skills enabling negotiation and influence with all grades of multidisciplinary staff in complex situations involving sensitive issues across the organisation and beyond.
• Demonstrate the ability to receive and provide highly complex and sensitive and sometimes contentious information to patients, relatives, carers, members of the public and staff, where there may be significant barriers to acceptance/understanding, requiring negotiating, persuasive, reassurance skills.
• Diffuse potentially hostile and antagonistic situations with staff, patients and relatives, using highly developed negotiation and interpersonal skills.
• Required to develop and make formal presentations to large groups in a manner that is effective and credible.

Analytical Skills

• To assess and interpret highly complex and sometimes conflicting information based on individual patient/environmental conditions and laboratory reports, e.g. the management of outbreaks.
• To make decisions regarding patient care (e.g. movement/transfer of patients with infections/communicable diseases, closure of wards, availability of isolation facilities) which involves assessing available resources.

Planning and Organisational Skills

• Will deputise for the Deputy Director of Infection Prevention and Control as required.
• Plan and organise the complex workload of the site Infection Prevention and Control Team. A full list of responsibilities is available within the Job Description.