Senior Occupational Therapist
The closing date is 30 April 2026
We have an exciting opportunity for a Senior Occupational Therapist to join our well established team based at Berwick Infirmary. The post holder will work primarily as part of a multidisciplinary team on the inpatient ward at Berwick Infirmary leading occupational therapy provision to support safe and timely discharges. The post holder is also expected to support with requests from other acute settings to facilitate local discharges utilising a discharge to assess model.
The successful candidate will have experience working with patients with a wide variety of conditions within a range of medical specialities including frailty/elderly medicine, orthopaedics and stroke. The post holder will be able to manage their own caseload as well as supervise junior and support staff on a daily basis.
Service hours are currently 08:30-16:30 Monday - Friday within Berwick Infirmary. There is an expectation of weekend working across other Northumbria Healthcare sites. Contractual hours are between 08:00-20:00 and this may be implemented in the future.
Please note we reserve the right to close this vacancy prior to the closing date once the required number of suitable applications have been received
Main duties of the job
* To ensure service provision is prioritised and service delivery is made effectively within resource constraints.
* To manage a defined caseload of patients, using evidence based clinical reasoning to assess, plan, implement and evaluate interventions.
* To assess for and monitor the provision of adaptations when appropriate.
* To provide clinical education, supervision and support to staff and students within the specialist field.
* To provide specialist advice to families, carers, and other health and social care professionals.
* To participate in the planning, development and evaluation of OT services within a designated area/team, holding responsibility for defined projects through specialist interest and steering groups.
* To contribute to the maintenance and development of the Occupational Therapy Team across Northumbria Healthcare Trust. To practice within the multidisciplinary team, providing specialist Occupational Therapy assessments, diagnosis and treatment using clinical reasoning skills.
Job responsibilities
* To work as part of a multidisciplinary team to provide efficient and effective facilitation of the patient journey through hospital and in community, to achieve safe and timely discharge, seamless transitions and help avoid unnecessary admission and re admission to hospital.
* To carry out appraisals with junior and support staff, as delegated by Line Manager.
* Managerially responsible to Team Lead.
* Clinically responsible to clinical OT Lead.
* To role model compassionate and inclusive leadership in order to shape the creation of a collective leadership culture within the trust. This means demonstrating a consistent leadership style which (a) engages, enables and empowers others (b) uses coaching to promote ownership of learning and quality improvement and (c) facilitates team working and collaboration within teams/departments and across organisational boundaries.
Person Specification
Qualifications
* Diploma/Degree in O.T.
* State registered with Health Professions Council.
* Qualified for a minimum of 18 months.
Experience and knowledge
* Substantial post registration experience with relevant experience in specialist area including individual and group work.
* Degree/Diploma in Occupational Therapy.
* Experience of O.T. practice in varied settings.
* Supervision of junior staff and students.
* Experience of research procedures.
Other Requirements
* It is an essential requirement of the role that the post holder has a valid driving licence and is either a car owner and able to use the car for work purposes, or has a Trust personal lease vehicle which may be used for the role. However, the Trust would consider making reasonable adjustments to the role, if necessary, to enable a disabled person to undertake the role.
Disclosure and Barring Service Check
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.
£39,959 to £48,117 a year pro rata per annum
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