Safeguarding Specialist Nurse

Job overview

This is an exciting opportunity for a highly motivated nurse with experience of safeguarding children, vulnerable adults and/or children in care with a genuine commitment to promoting the welfare of children. The successful candidate will have substantial experience as a paediatric nurse and be educated to degree level with evidence of further academic study relevant to safeguarding, children in care or the public health agenda.

As part of Safeguarding and Statutory Services you will be responsible for providing visible leadership, knowledge, and expertise in relation to safeguarding and children in care for all Trust staff.   You will work with a range of multi-disciplinary colleagues as well as external health colleague’s multi-agencies partners such as primary care, Local Authorities, Local Safeguarding Children Partnerships and Local Safeguarding Adult Boards.

You must be a registered nurse, with experience of safeguarding children and knowledge of current statutory legislation and excellent communication and interpersonal skills.

As a senior member of the team, you will play a pivotal role in maintaining efficient and effective safeguarding systems within the Trust.

The service is committed to supporting staff to work flexibly whilst providing a high quality service across the Trust. Team members are based at our hospital or community sites and provide visible leadership and support. Team members may be required to work over 7 days.

Main duties of the job

The Safeguarding Specialist Nurse is an integral member of the Safeguarding and Statutory Services Team. The role is to support the Senior Safeguarding Team to fulfil the statutory and safeguarding responsibilities of the Trust.     To ensure safe and effective service provision in respect of safeguarding and Children in Care, and delivery of high standards of holistic family centred care.    To provide specialist safeguarding and children in care advice, and high-quality safeguarding supervisory support to staff.

To contribute to an ethos, in which reflective practice and self-questioning are accepted and actively promoted.

To identify any practice areas or systems that may place children, young people, or vulnerable adults at risk of harm. To work with relevant practitioners to reduce the level of risk and inform/support the Senior Safeguarding Team, in the management of any identified risks.     To deliver and monitor compliance of Safeguarding and Children in Care Training Strategy.     To undertake audit projects and implement findings to improve service provision.    To act as a point of contact for other professionals in meeting the needs of vulnerable children, for example, 0-19 Services, Social Services, Police  and Education.

To work as part of a multi-agency team to ensure children, young people and adults at risk are safeguarded and able to reach their full potential.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

The Safeguarding Specialist Nurse is an integral member of the Safeguarding and Statutory Services Team. The role is to support the Senior Safeguarding Team to fulfil the statutory and safeguarding obligations of the Trust.

To ensure safe and effective service provision for vulnerable children/young people including children in care and vulnerable adults, in the delivery of high standards of holistic family centred care.

To provide a key role in supporting all activities necessary to ensure Alder Hey, meets its responsibilities to effectively safeguard children, young people, vulnerable adults, and Children in Care (CiC).

To provide specialist safeguarding and children in care advice, and high-quality safeguarding supervisory support to staff within the Trust.

To contribute to an ethos, in which reflective practice and self-questioning are accepted and actively promoted.

To identify any practice areas or systems that may place children, young people, or vulnerable adults at risk of harm. To work with relevant practitioners to reduce the level of risk and inform/support the senior leadership team, in the management of any identified risks.

To deliver and monitor compliance of Safeguarding and Children in Care Training Strategy within the Trust and multi-agency settings.

To undertake audit projects, implementing findings to improve provision of a responsive safeguarding service for the Trust.

To act as a point of contact for other professionals in tracking the movements and needs of vulnerable children, for example, Health Visitors (HVs), Family Nurse Partnership (FNPs), School Nurses (SNs), Safeguarding Teams, Social Services and Education.

To work as part of a multi-agency team and directly with children, young people, and vulnerable adults to ensure they are kept safe and able to reach their full potential.

To provide safeguarding advice and support on the Safeguarding Duty Rota which may include:

• Sharing information to Multi Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH) and Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Conference (MARAC) as requested.
• Supporting staff across the Trust and provide quality assurance of Social Care and Early Help referrals.
• Providing reactive and planned safeguarding supervision.
• Responding to Access to Health requests on behalf of Safeguarding and Statutory Services.
• Attending multi-disciplinary and multi-agency meetings to represent Safeguarding and Statutory Services, for example Discharge Planning Meetings and Strategy Meetings.
• Reviewing and managing Safeguarding Inpatient Lists.
• Supporting clinical teams around delayed and complex discharges where there is a safeguarding need,
• Supporting Child Protection Medicals and Sexual Assault Referral Centre (SARC) forensic examinations as required.
• Facilitating and leading team daily safety huddles.
• Co-ordinating and completing daily safety checks within the department.
• Escalating any issues of patient safety or concern to the Senior Nurse on Duty and/or Named Nurses.
• Supporting the Sudden Unexpected Death in Childhood (SUDiC) Protocol.
• Supporting the Acute Life-Threatening Event (ALTE) Protocol.

Contribute to the development and implementation of Safeguarding and Children in Care policies and procedures.

Quality Assurance of Initial Health Assessments (IHAs) and support care planning discussions for children/young people entering the care system or being adopted.

Impart specialist safeguarding statutory knowledge and guidance to all staff at Alder Hey in regard of children, young people, and adults at risk.

Develop and deliver mandatory and key topics training in line with the safeguarding and Children in Care training strategy.

Support safeguarding and Children in Care administrative colleagues to maintain activity reports for internal and external governance reporting.

Represent the safeguarding service within external partnership forums and sub-groups.

Work with partner agencies ensuring information sharing, training, and good partnership working.

Provide specialist advice and support to all staff in relation to child deaths, alongside the Safeguarding Consultant.

Support the Named Nurse for Safeguarding Children, Young People and Adults in fulfilling child death statutory responsibilities.

Act as a link Specialist Safeguarding Nurse to the Trust division providing a point of contact to services/teams, supervision, and training as per their needs.

Support the Named Nurse for Safeguarding Children, Young People and Adults and the Named Nurse for Children in Care with the collation of safeguarding and Children in Care data and evidence for Key Performance Indicators (KPI).

Provide specialist safeguarding support, advice, and supervision to identified team/service within the Trust. This could require spending part of the working week co-located with specialist teams who are based off the main hospital site within community settings. These teams/services include:

• Major Trauma Team
• Violence Reduction Team (Navigator Team)
• Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS)
• NHS Children and Young People’s Gender Service (North West)