Medical Receptionist

**Part Time Receptionist -21 Hours per week immediate start**

**Job Purpose**:

- To provide a comprehensive service to the patients and the clinical team, as part of the whole primary care team. Responsibility for dealing compassionately and efficiently with all patient interactions.
- To provide support services across the Brunel Medical practice estate of which there are three sites, that operate between the hours of 08.30 - 18.30, Monday - Friday, with the possibility of week-end working in the future.

**Main Duties on Reception**:

- To follow practice protocols in relation to appointments, telephone contact, messages, requests for home visits, repeat prescriptions and all other patient contact.
- To ensure that all contact with patients is done in a sensitive way with a high level of customer service skills, taking into account that patients, their relatives and carers may be distressed at times.
- Telephones are to be answered promptly and politely and within the protocols of the practice.
- To make, change and delete appointments as appropriate, whilst taking into account the needs of the clinical team.
- To direct patients where appropriate to the correct part of the surgery in a timely manner and keep a watching brief on the situation around clinic delays etc. to inform patients attending appointments.
- Being aware of who is in the waiting area and how long patients have been waiting, making the appropriate enquiries if a patient has been waiting longer than would be usual.
- Support and assist the doctors during surgery times as required.
- Ensure doctors surgeries are stocked with the necessary paperwork and forms to enable their surgeries to proceed without interruption.
- Liaise with secondary care and other health care providers as appropriate.
- To inform patients of payments to be made for non NHS services and receive and record such payments.

**Other related duties**:

- To extract patient records and file them as appropriate.
- To proactively contact patients to pass on information from the clinical staff relating to appointments or information.
- To handle specimens for pathology labs as appropriate, taking care with accurate labeling and appropriate handling.
- To maintain adequate stationery and other stocks and ensure that the appropriate person is informed of replenishment requirements.
- Ensuring Temporary Resident forms are filled in correctly and entered onto computer for the GPs and the nursing team.
- Ensuring that New Patient forms are filled in correctly by the patient with necessary ID provided.
- Process new patient registrations as required.
- Process prescription requests as required.

**Communication and Working Relationships**:

- Day to day contact with patients in response to queries and to pass messages to clinical staff, make appointments etc.
- Able to manage day to day contact with patients, their relatives and carers who may at times be distressed or act unreasonably.
- Able to be objective and helpful when managing patient enquiries, making or changing appointments or following up results.
- To work as an integral part of the whole practice team.

**Confidentiality**
- While seeking treatment, patients entrust us with, or allow us to gather, sensitive information in relation to their health and other matters. They do so in confidence and have the right to expect that staff will respect their privacy and act appropriately.
- In the performance of the duties outlined in this Job Description, the post-holder may have access to confidential information relating to patients and their carers’, Practice staff and other healthcare workers. They may also have access to information relating to the Practice as a business organisation. All such information from any source is to be regarded as strictly confidential.
- Information relating to patients, carers, colleagues, other healthcare workers or the business of the Practice may only be divulged to authorised persons in accordance with the Practice policies and procedures relating to confidentiality and the protection of personal and sensitive data.

**Health & Safety**

The post-holder will assist in promoting and maintaining their own and others’ health, safety and security as defined in the practice Health & Safety Core Policy, and all other policies, procedures and documents linked to health & safety, and the practices’ Infection Control Policy and published procedures. This will include:

- Using personal security systems within the workplace according to Practice guidelines
- Identifying the risks involved in work activities and undertaking such activities in a way that manages those risks
- Making effective use of training to update knowledge and skills
- Using appropriate infection control procedures, maintaining work areas in a tidy and safe way and free from hazards
- Actively reporting of health and safety hazards and infection hazards immediately when recognised
- Keeping own work areas and general / p