Speech and Language Therapist

Job overview

We have a fantastic opportunity for a band 5 SLT to join our clinically passionate, friendly inpatient speech and language therapy team at the Royal Surrey Hospital.

The post holder will have the opportunity to rotate across the Stroke & Neurology and Acute Medical SLT teams. We are seeking enthusiastic and motivated therapists with a keen desire to learn the skills necessary to excel in these rotations. Ideal candidates will have completed post-graduate competencies in acquired dysphagia management and have experience of working in an acute hospital setting at a band 5 level.

The SLT team have extensive expertise in the management of patients with stroke, neurology, critical care, neuro-oncology, general medicine, head and neck cancer (including laryngectomy), and voice disorders. The SLT team place a high value on the acquisition and development of evidence based clinical skills for the benefit of patients. We offer a supportive environment with regular team meetings and a rolling in-service CPD programme.

The SLT team are committed to sharing best practice in the fields of acquired communication and swallow disorders, so provide regular training sessions for doctors, nurses and healthcare assistants.

Main duties of the job

• Using your skilled clinical reasoning, assessment, diagnosis and treatment of patients seeking advice from senior colleagues when necessary.
• Ensuring patients, carers and families are involved in the planning and prioritisation of their care plans wherever possible (including family meetings and keyworker role on the Stroke unit).
• Ensuring patients give informed consent prior to treatment, working within the legal framework with patients who lack the capacity to give valid consent.
• Formulating and delivering individual therapy programmes based on current evidence-based practice (EBP) and evaluation of outcomes.
• Lead on planning and running the weekly communication group on the Stroke unit.
• Ensuring a well-co-ordinated care plan/patient pathway through discussion of therapy findings and planned goals.
• Communicating complex condition-related information from assessment to patients, carers, families and members of Multi-Disciplinary team/other professions.
• Writing discharge reports reflecting specialist knowledge.
• Providing teaching and training (formal and informal) to Student Speech and Language Therapists (SLTs) and members of the Multi-Disciplinary Team (MDT).
• Generate appropriate strategies for caseload management.
• Participation in Quality Improvement and research opportunities.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

• To provide a specialist service to in-patients including assessment, diagnosis, therapeutic intervention and evaluation of outcomes.
• To provide teaching and training (formal and informal) to Student Speech and Language Therapists (SLTs) and members of the Multi-Disciplinary Team (MDT) including Basic Swallow Screen Testing (BSST) for nurses with support from the BSST lead SLT.
• To manage own caseload independently.

Applicant requirements

You must have appropriate UK professional registration.

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.