Play Specialist

An exciting opportunity has arisen for an enthusiastic and motivated individual qualified hospital play specialist to join the Paediatric team based on the Children’s Unit. The post is part time and for a fixed term to cover maternity leave.

The posts will involve supporting children undergoing elective day surgery and outpatient procedures as well as acute admissions admitted with medical, surgical, orthopaedic and psychiatric problems. We are looking for a Play specialist who is committed to delivering high quality care and has the skills to implement specialised play in a hospital setting.

You will have the skills to assess, plan and implement age appropriate play programmes including preparation and distraction. You will have sound interpersonal and communication skills and demonstrate a commitment to working within a busy multidisciplinary unit delivering care to children and young people on the ward, in clinics and on home visits. You will be expected to work as part of the team and be responsible for developing the hospital play service.
- Promote the comfort and safety of all children and their families.
- Maintain general tidiness of the playroom, ensuring toys and play activities are safe, clean and available for all children admitted to the ward.
- Participate in play appropriate to the needs of children in hospital using play to minimise the adverse effects of hospitalisation.
- Work in partnership with families in providing appropriate care and play for patients. Ensuring that parents have appropriate information regarding the play facilities available to them during their stay.
- Work in partnership with the hospital education team to provide co-ordinated and structured activities for children within the ward setting.
- Undertake training as required, taking all reasonable opportunities to develop knowledge and skills in order to promote/develop the service
- Understand the child protection policy and work within these guidelines, liaising with the Clinical Nurse Specialist for safeguarding children.
- Facilitate participation with the regional play benchmarking group and other quality assurance activities.
- Undertake planning and implementation of therapy based play and distraction therapies for use during clinical procedures.
- Assess, plan, deliver and review goal based play activities where necessary for specific patients and to keep comprehensive documentation about the implementation and progress.
- Provide support and advice regarding play services to all areas of the Trust accessed by children.

We are always looking for enterprising and innovative approaches to the way we provide our services. WE are a national centre for telemedicine and introduced telehalth to the UK offender healthcare sector and also provide the service to patients in their care homes. Community matters to us and we are supported by 400 dedicated volunteers and have strong links with Bradford University, Craven college and Leeds City College to ensure we inspire the workforce of the future.
We want to attract staff who embrace out 'Right Care' behaviours of compassion, a commitment to quality of care and working together for patients - we want to make these part of our DNA.

For further details and full details of the role please see the attached job description and person specification attached