Renal Booking Administrator

Job summary

An exciting opportunity has arisen to join the Renal Admin Team based at Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton. This is a part time post at 30 hours, with flexibility on how these hours are worked across the week.

The Renal Admin Team support a number of services in the department including general nephrology, chronic kidney disease, acute kidney injury, transplants and nurse led clinics. They book appointments for Royal Sussex County Hospital and across the satellite clinics.

Main duties of the job

To provide efficient administration in all aspects of patient appointment booking with strict adherence and compliance to the Trust's patient access policy.

To manage the outpatient waiting list and ensure this is accurately maintained, with capacity issues escalated to the Patient Access Manager.

To communicate appointment details to patients with courtesy, dignity and respect.

To arrange transport for patients appointments.

To ensure clinics are fully utilised and to escalate any gaps to the Patient Access Manager.

To answer and support patient queries.

About us

At UHSussex, diversity is our strength, and we want you to feel included to help us always put the Patient First, as shown in our Outstanding for Caring CQC rating. Your uniqueness and experiences will be part of our creative and innovative community where everyone is encouraged to succeed. We have a range of Staff Networks to help break down barriers, and can offer a buddy to help new members settle in. We're proud to be a Disability Confident Employer (Level 2) and a Veteran Aware Trust. We treat our patients and staff with the same compassion and empathy we expect for ourselves. We're here for them when they need us, and we go above and beyond to meet their needs. This can be seen in our Wellbeing Programme for staff which is extensive and designed to support you when you need it - because we know that to look after others we must first look after ourselves. As a university trust and a leader in healthcare research, we value learning, teaching and training so that we can be the best that we can be. From the moment you start with us and throughout your career we will help you to grow and develop. We hope that in choosing UHSussex you are choosing a long and happy career where you will be able to see the difference you make and feel valued for all that you do. We look forward to receiving your application and the start of your journey with UHSussex.

Job description

Job responsibilities

Role Summary

This is a multi-skilled role whereby the post-holder will be required to gain a strong knowledge of outpatient clinics to make, amend, and cancel outpatient appointments in line with the patient access policy, and according to waiting time and clinical urgency. The post holder will handle incoming telephone calls from patients, GPs, and other hospital staff with a range of queries. The post holder will gain an in-depth knowledge for clinics within a designated specialty area but will also be expected to gain a broader knowledge of other clinics. This role will range from the registration of new patient referrals, to handling GP and patients queries for clinics to making/amending and cancelling appointments. The post holder will have an impact on a patient journey throughout all aspects of the outpatient booking process and will be responsible for recording all patient contact and bookings on the patient administration system.

The main duties of the post are:

To register new patient referrals and send these for clinical triage so that the urgency of the appointment can be highlighted by a clinician. To book, amend and sometimes cancel outpatient appointments for patients via the telephone and to confirm these details by letter using the patient administration system. To answer telephone calls from patients, GPs, and other Trust staff, always maintaining confidentiality and ensuring that a patient focussed/professional service is maintained.

Key Working Relationships

Patients and their Relatives/Carers/Parents/Guardians Renal admin team Clinicians Outpatient Nursing Clinical and Directorate Management Teams GP and Community Services Outpatient Reception Services

Main Duties and Responsibilities

To register new patient referrals and send these for clinical triage so that the urgency of the appointment can be highlighted by a clinician. To index referrals in the Trust referral management system so that the correct clinician can review the referral. To update patient demographics in the Trust patient administration at time of referral registration. To book, amend and sometimes cancel outpatient appointments for patients via the telephone and to confirm these details by letter using the patient administration system if required. To work to targets and objectives, managing a workload or phone calls, booking of appointments, dealing with queries, data management and general daily duties. To respond to patient needs and ensure that their individual needs are always met, making adjustments where required in order for them to access the care that they need. For example, booking interpreters for patients whose first language is not English. To provide and receive complex and sensitive information to and from patients about their appointment and give explanations and instructions clearly and concisely where barriers to communication may exist. To raise and escalate any questions where you do not have a solution for the patient so that this can be investigated to ensure that there is no delay to patient treatment. To follow the patient access policy when booking and amending patient appointments and to always book patients in order, by waiting time and by clinical urgency. The postholder must advise the Access Manager if the clinic capacity is insufficient to accommodate number appointments required and ensure the Access manager is always informed. To provide information to the Access Manager regarding the number of patients still waiting to be booked as requested. To ensure that when a patient or referrer cancels a routine appointment, and no further appointment is required that the waiting list and referral entries are closed on Care Flow. To regularly validate the Patient Tracking List for any discrepancies, action as appropriate and audit against referrals received. To ensure that the correct appointment type is booked , new/follow up, face to face or telephone. To update referral urgency and sub-specialty information on the Trust patient administration system following a clinical review of every referral. To answer telephone calls from patients, GPs, and other Trust staff, always maintaining confidentiality and ensuring that a patient focussed/professional service is maintained. To cancel clinics in line with the Trust policy, ensuring that the correct approval process has been followed. This will involve cancelling patient appointments and where possible re-booking to another date. To ensure the correct recording of cancellation reason and reason in the Trust patient administration system, ensuring that all updates are recorded in the referral comments. To update patient demographics on the Trust patient administration system at time of booking if there has been a change. To ensure that text message confirmations are sent when making or amending appointments. To work under pressure, maintaining the ability to multi-task whilst dealing with complex and sometimes emotional situations, such as cancelling patient appointments at short notice. To problem solve and escalate any issues and record all information accurately. To always maintain professionalism when dealing with patients and colleagues, ensuring that the expected standards at work are maintained. Organise and prioritise assignments to complete work in a timely and efficient manner, particularly when there are changes in workload or demands. Escalate as required so that help/assistance can be arranged. Carry out any other duties that may be required from time to time in line with the job holder's grade, experience and job title.

Learning and Development

Attend mandatory training updates as required. Undertake training as necessary in line with the development of the post and as agreed with the line manager as part of the personal development process. Achieve and demonstrate agreed standards of personal and professional development within agreed timescales. Identify own learning needs and jointly plan training requirements with your line manager Participate in the Trusts appraisal process to discuss how your role will help deliver the best possible care to our patients and help to deliver any changes in service.

This job description is an outline of the role and responsibilities. From time to time due to the needs of the service, we may ask you to flexibly undertake other duties that are consistent with your role and banding, including project work, internal job rotation and absence cover.

The job description and person specification may be reviewed on an ongoing basis in accordance with the changing needs of the department and the organisation.

Mission and values

The mission of University Hospitals Sussex what we are striving to achieve is to provide:

excellent care every time

All our efforts to do this put the interests of our patients first and foremost, and are underpinned by our values:

Compassion Communication Teamwork Respect Professionalism Inclusion

These values were selected by our staff, patients and public when we were talking about the merger and the sort of organisation we want University Hospitals Sussex to be.

Our mission and values are extremely important to us and we expect everyone who works at University Hospitals Sussex in any capacity to share and uphold them.

Patient First

Patient First is our Trust-wide approach to improving the quality of care for patients and to build and embed a culture where staff can be confident that their views matter and will be heard. The aim is to empower all staff to lead change, raise issues, concerns, identify and implement areas for improvement within the workplace and find solutions collectively as part of a team. Staff will be equipped with skills to identify improvement opportunities and supported to see those through It encourages all staff to be innovative and drive forward quality improvement and positive changes in their areas. The philosophy behind this is centred on: Standardisation, system redesign and the improvement of patient pathways to eliminate error and waste and improve quality The patient being at the heart of every element of change Embedding cultural change across the organisation, where everyone is passionate about delivering exceptional quality every time and where better never stops. Continuous improvement of our services through small steps of change Constantly testing the patient pathway to see how we can develop Encouraging frontline staff to lead the redesign processes Equal voices for all Engagement of staff is a big factor in job performance. Good engagement leads to improved quality, mortality and safety measures

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion

Inclusion and respect are core values at UHSussex, and we are committed to diversity and equality. This means treating colleagues and patients with professionalism, ensuring everyone feels welcome and included, valuing different backgrounds and experiences, and challenging inequalities.

Having all our staff feel safe, supported, included and valued will lead to better care and outcomes for our patients our True North Objective.

All staff have a duty to report any behaviours which contravene this to their managers.

Person Specification

Experience / Qualifications

Essential

Customer Service / Administration Experience Good standard of computer skills

Desirable

NHS Administration Experience Experience of using Care Flow Working knowledge of the patient access policy and national NHS targets

Skills

Essential

Excellent verbal and written communication skills with the ability to communicate with patients/service users and staff at all levels of the organisation Ability to organise and prioritise own workload Ability to exercise discretion and ensure that patient confidentiality is maintained at all times. Remain flexible and adaptable to alterations in policies and procedures, proposing changes where appropriate Ability to remain calm in dealing with stressful situations, this will involve cancelling patients appointments and delivering unpleasant news

Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion

Essential

Evidence of having championed diversity in previous roles (as appropriate to Evidence of having undertaken own development to improve understanding of equalities issues

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