Hospital Play Assistant

We have a rare opportunity to join our Play team on the Child and Adolescent Unit.

The team currently consists of 3 staff who work closely with the Paediatric nursing and medical team. To provide a high quality, holistic play service for children and their families.

To work as part of the play team to provide a high quality, holistic play service for children and their families, enabling them to feel safe and at ease within the hospital environment. To ensure all children have appropriate access to play activities whilst in hospital. To implement play programmes prepared by the play specialists to enable children and young people to understand, accept and co-operate with treatment.

Mid Cheshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (MCHFT) provides good quality, safe and effective healthcare to the people of Cheshire and beyond. The Trust, which manages Leighton Hospital in Crewe, Victoria Infirmary in Northwich, and Elmhurst Intermediate Care Centre in Winsford, was established as an NHS Trust in April 1991 and became a Foundation Trust in April 2008.

We employ almost 5,000 members of staff, provide around 540 hospital beds, with a range of services including accident and emergency, maternity, outpatients, therapies, and children's health.

The Trust is also part of Central Cheshire Integrated Care Partnership (CCICP), a unique local health partnership that provides a range of community services for people across South Cheshire and Vale Royal.

During the Coronavirus pandemic, the Trust was recognised nationally for its ‘Be Safe Be EquiPPEd’ campaign, which aimed to make the Trust as safe as possible for staff and patients, through supporting the correct use of PPE.

The results in the 2020 national NHS Staff Survey showed improvements in all elements of the safety culture theme, with 92% of respondents feeling their role made a difference to our patients. We were also recognised nationally for our workforce health and wellbeing initiatives.

At Mid Cheshire, we value our staff and appreciate that in order to give our patients the best quality, compassionate care, we also need to look after our colleagues.
- To provide developmental play and recreation for all ages and diversities in an effort to fulfil emotional, social and developmental needs
- To work as a member of the multidisciplinary team, contributing to patient treatment and care plans
- To use play as a tool to communicate and build a rapport with children and young people attending hospital
- To provide interesting and stimulating play programmes for children, young people and their families
- To promote the awareness of the emotional needs of children and young people in hospital and the importance of play within the multidisciplinary team
- To help create a safe and welcoming environment for all children to experience play whilst in hospital
- To document play interventions and any observations of children playing in line with Trust policy and procedure
- To provide play based observations to influence and support the overall assessment of the child and report any concerns to the play specialist and/or the nurse in charge
- To contribute to the selection, monitoring and ordering of play resources to reflect the needs of the patient group
- To be responsible for maintaining play equipment, in accordance with trust health, safety and infection prevention and control policies
- To support the orientation, training and supervision of new staff and students
- Where appropriate to support and involve parents in their child’s treatment and play plans
- To assist in establishing communication links with other agencies involved with the child
- To refer children to Local Education Authority who require educational support
- Ensure up to date knowledge of child protection procedures
- To respect the individuality, values, cultural and religious diversity of patients and their families, contributing to the provision of a service which is sensitive to their needs
- Ensure compliance with Trust policies, procedures and guidelines for self and others, by taking action/alerting senior management team if practice appears to contravene policy, or if concerned about any aspect of patient care.
- Take responsibility for own learning and development by recognising and taking advantage of all opportunities to learn, including full participation in KSF/appraisal, supervision, action learning and by maintaining a professional/personal portfolio of learning.
- Comply with Infection Prevention and Control (IP&C) policies and procedures as appropriate to their role and responsibilities in their individual work setting. Staff are
- required to be personally accountable for their actions and be responsible for their own compliance in relation to IP&C polices, protocols or advice.
- Always work in accordance with the values and behaviours of the trust