Medical Secretary General Surgery

QUEEN ELIZABETH HOSPITAL

MEDICAL SECRETARY

GENERAL SURGERY

**Full time**: 37.5 hrs pw

We are looking for an experienced Medical Secretary to join this busy, friendly department.

We are looking for an energetic and enthusiastic person with a mature, responsible and flexible outlook. Previous experience as a medical secretary with audio-typing skills is essential. You will have a caring and courteous manner and enjoy working with and meeting people. You will also be able to work unsupervised and display initiative, whilst being aware of team membership.

You will be responsible for typing clinical and administrative letters and other correspondence within the strict turnaround timescales. Answering and dealing with telephone enquiries and general admin duties.

To arrange a visit or for further information about the post, please contact Maria Todd-Campbell, Medical Secretary and Rota Manager for Surgery - 020 8836 6848.

To provide a full secretarial and clerical service to the Consultant and the Consultant’s team.

The post is a vital link between the patient, the Consultant, the wider Trust and other people involved in the provision of health care. The post holder may on occasion supervise other secretarial and clerical staff.

KEY RESPONISBILITIES

To act as a central point of information and communication for the clinical team.

To provide a full secretarial support service to consultants and members of their teams in respect to their general medical duties and specialist work.

To act independently ensuring that daily tasks and ongoing workloads are prioritised and completed in agreed timeframes.

Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust is a community focused provider of local and acute care, providing high quality services to over one million people living across the London boroughs of Lewisham, Greenwich and Bexley. With a turnover of around £700 million, we provide services at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Woolwich, University Hospital Lewisham and a range of community settings in Lewisham. We also provide some services at Queen Mary’s Hospital in Sidcup.

As an organisation, we’ve made significant improvements for patients and staff in the last two and-a-half years. This is reflected in our most recent Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspection (from February 2020), which found improvements across the organisation and gave us an improved rating of “Good” in the Well-Led and Effective domains, in addition to the rating of “Good” that we had already achieved in the Caring domain. Our staff culture change programme has been key to the Trust’s improvement journey, as we’ve stabilised our workforce by reducing vacancy rates and improving staff retention. We’ve also significantly increased the representation of minority ethnic leaders across our clinical and corporate teams.

KEY TASKS

To act as first point of contact on behalf of the consultant and the Trust and deal effectively and courteously with all enquiries from GPs, patients, other departments within the Trust and all other departments.

To type all clinical letters, including those of a sometimes distressing or emotional nature, from audiotape or direct dictation as agreed.

To organise and service meetings on behalf of the Consultant and the Consultant’s team, taking and distributing minutes as required.

To deal with all telephone calls relating to the service, ensuring patient focus is maintained and enquiries are handled in a courteous, tactful and prompt manner, and respecting patient confidentiality at all times.

To prioritise and process incoming correspondence and ensure that it is dealt with promptly by the appropriate member of staff.

To ensure that investigation reports are brought to the attention of the appropriate medical team and signed off by the appropriate member of staff. Arrange for the request and/or safe onward transmissions of patient investigation reports and film to other sites where necessary.

To maintain filing systems that facilitates the effective running of the department.

To use the appropriate IT system for checking patient information and appointments.

To manage patient records appropriately, ensuring an up-to-date record is maintained of all case notes returned from the wards and clinics, that patient case notes are available for clinics and appointments and are dispatched to other departments or hospitals as necessary.