Specialist Critical Care Dietitian

An exciting opportunity has arisen for a 1 year fixed term Band 7 Specialist Critical Care Dietitian to join our friendly and enthusiastic Adult Dietetics Department at the Royal London Hospital.

This position presents an excellent prospect for a highly organised and ambitious Dietitian to work in a specialist tertiary critical care unit, covering a variety of specialisms including patients with traumatic and neurological injuries along with general medical and surgical patients. As a critical care specialist you will be able to work autonomously to provide complex nutrition support to this varied cohort of patients while having the opportunity to support and develop more junior dietitians to specialise in this area too.

The successful candidate should be very motivated and hard-working with previous experience of managing a very busy caseload along with experience of leadership and successful line management. You will also have the opportunity to deputise for the Lead Critical Care Dietitian as needed.

There is scope to expand and develop the dietetic team and the successful candidate is expected to engage and lead in service development. Excellent communication skills and multidisciplinary working is required. The critical care unit at the Royal London Hospital is at the forefront of research and its multidisciplinary team is paving the way to consider different strategies for ensuring our patients receive optimal nutritional support.

Main duties of the job

• To provide expert dietetic knowledge and experience to provide an effective dietetic service to complex critical care patients requiring Nutritional Support. This includes enteral and parenteral support.
• To provide specialist assessment, treatment and/or advice to in-patients
• To work closely with all members of the multi-disciplinary team.
• To actively contribute to the development of the acute dietetic service and the dietetic service on critical care.
• To support and supervise dietetic staff
• To support and provide training as required to the MDT

Benefits

• Competitive salary: £58,133 to £65,261 per annum
• Fixed term contract for 12 months
• Full-time, flexible working pattern

Person Specification

Qualifications

• BSc Nutrition & Dietetics or relevant postgraduate qualification.
• Qualification in area of specialisation or evidence of significant experience in speciality area.
• HCPC registered.

Experience

• Extensive experience in the area of complex nutrition support (to include significant experience within the area of Critical Care).
• Experience in the provision of Parenteral Nutrition
• Experience in taking part in project work that supports improvement in service or supports a change in practice
• Understanding of team dynamics and experience of working within a multidisciplinary team.
• Experience in developing a service and establishing/maintaining a dietetic presence within an MDT.

Skills

• Experience of delivering undergraduate student supervision and clinical education to postgraduate standard in area of speciality.
• Experience of supervision and line management of staff including completing appraisals, 1:1 meetings and objective setting and able to work within Trust policy and support line reports to do the same.
• Ability to work effectively single handedly with individuals and groups, and deliver complex nutritional information.
• Ability to use behavioural change/ motivational interviewing techniques to facilitate change.
• Ability to problem solve, analyse complex clinical problems and create practical solutions to provide best clinical care.
• Able to demonstrate and effectively utilise leadership skills.
• Able to undertake accurate anthropometric measurements eg. weights, heights, skinfold thickness to support the assessment of patients nutritional status.
• Able to interpret a variety of complex clinical information to make dietetic diagnosis in area of speciality.
• Ability to implement dietetic care plan and provide highly specialised advice concerning the care of patients in area of speciality.
• Regularly undertakes R&D activity e.g. Critical Appraisal, Audit and is confident in the audit process.
• Ability to take own initiative and to be the lead for clinical speciality.
• Able to work with young adults and the understanding of their needs and priorities.