Locum Consultant Paediatrician

Job overview

ST GEORGE'S UNIVERSITY HOSPITALS NHS FOUNDATION TRUST

ST GEORGE'S HOSPITAL, LONDON SW17 0QT

Locum Consultant Paediatrician - 6 MONTH FIXED TERM CONTRACT

10 PA role

Applications are invited for a dynamic, enthusiastic consultant paediatrician to join the Acute General Paediatric Service at St George’s Hospital. This is a 6 month fixed term opportunity, with one full-time 10PA post available.

The service has undergone expansion in the last 5 years as part of the Trust initiative to comply with acute care standards, enable the provision of a dedicated consultant of the week for the inpatient wards and emergency care and an out of hours rota with a resident consultant presence over extended hours seven days per week.  In 2018 an ambulatory unit for children and young people opened, in addition to the paediatric assessment unit in the Children’s Emergency Department.  This consultant delivered unit has improved emergency flow, reduced inpatient admissions and provides a better quality of care for patients with urgent care needs.

Main duties of the job

The postholder will work with ten other colleagues to provide a full general paediatric service.  This will include a 1:5 attending week with all elective commitments cancelled, to cover either inpatient wards or the ambulatory unit. During these weeks they will provide daily ward rounds/patient reviews, attend board rounds and safety huddles, cover emergency admissions and referrals, liaise with PICU regarding step-down patients and attend the morning and afternoon handover rounds.

The non-service weeks are varied and will include outpatient work, education, academic and management activities.  A key development in outpatient work in the last five years has been to provide integrated clinics in primary care and improved rapid access general clinics.  The post holder will form part of a locality based team within the local area, responsible for delivering an integrated service with primary care practitioners.  St George’s paediatric department is a highly rated teaching and training centre and there will be plenty of opportunity to contribute to undergraduate and postgraduate teaching activities.

We encourage all general paediatric consultants to develop a specialty interest to work within and alongside our specialty colleagues.  Currently we are looking for paediatricians with a special interest in asthma, epilepsy and non-malignant haematology.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Inpatient wards

The paediatric in-patient facilities are made up of four paediatric wards - a day case ward, a surgical ward, a medical ward, and an infectious diseases / oncology ward. There is a 12 bedded intensive care / high dependency unit with a step-down facility.  The general paediatric ward has a dedicated young person’s bay.  During attending weeks the postholder will be consultant of the week, responsible for leading the care of all general admissions.

Ambulatory care centre

The dedicated children’s ambulatory facility (Blue Sky Centre) aims to improve flow through the emergency department, avoid attendance through enhanced support to primary care and facilitate early ward discharge.  It is primarily a consultant delivered service with an active programme to develop Advanced Nurse Practitioners to support an expansion in future years.  Children requiring medical daycase treatment will be managed here in co-ordination with community children’s nursing and medical specialties.  Cover for the ambulatory unit will also be provided on a consultant of the week basis.

Outpatient clinics

The post holder will provide a general paediatric clinic in the non-service weeks (32 per year). These clinics will see both new and follow up patients. They will also provide rapid access clinics for urgent / semi-urgent GP referrals on a rota basis, and have regular integrated clinics in local Primary Care hubs.  The post holder will also have the opportunity to develop outpatient specialist skills in management of chronic conditions, working alongside tertiary and secondary paediatric subspecialist services at St George’s and our partner tertiary paediatric centres.  These include (but are not limited to) asthma, epilepsy and non-malignant haematology (particularly haemoglobinopathies).

Out of hours work and on call

The out of hours duties will be approximately 1:11. On weekdays, including Fridays, the consultant on call takes over at 17:00 and remains resident in the hospital until 22:00, after handover to the night staff. At weekends the consultant is on site and performing ward rounds and emergency care between 08:30 and 22:00 and on call from home thereafter.

Management responsibility

The postholder will be expected to work with the Care Group Lead, Clinical Governance Lead and service management team on audit, guideline development and review of clinical incidents. A major goal of the Care Group is to extend collaborative working between the Care Group and stakeholders, including the Emergency Department, CAMHS, surgical Care Groups and primary care.  The posts will include liaison roles to develop strategy, improve joint working and implement improvements in these key areas. There are a number of opportunities within the Trust to take on management roles extending outside Children’s Services for suitably skilled applicants.  All SPA time will be expected to demonstrate outcomes that will be reviewed at annual job planning.

Education, training and development

The postholder will be expected to be involved with teaching junior paediatric staff in the morning tutorials, case presentations and Paediatric Grand Round. They will also have clinical and educational supervision responsibilities for trainees and will need to maintain competencies to support this role. They will be expected to support teaching of undergraduate students through SiFT funding and the department has close links with St George’s University of London.  Funding is available for personal CPD activities.