Telephone Befriending Volunteer

As a telephone befriender to our Service Users, you will help to reduce the feeling of social isolation and loneliness. Volunteers are required to telephone a newly discharge Service User on a regular basis, usually for between 10 - 30 minutes giving them a listening ear and building up a mutual trust for each other. Having someone to talk to and someone to listen, could really make a difference to a Service Users life.

The main responsibility of this placement is to provide phone support to service users at home after discharge.

The project assistant will match you to an appropriate patient and will provide you with their contact details and brief history post discharge. You will be introduced to the patient and will agree the frequency and length of the session at the first phone call.

Oxleas offers a wide range of NHS healthcare services to people in community and secure environment settings. Our services include community health care such as district nursing and speech and language therapy, care for people with learning disabilities and mental health care such as psychiatry, nursing and therapies. Our multidisciplinary teams look after people of all ages and we work in close partnership with other parts of the NHS, local councils and the voluntary sector and through our new provider collaboratives. Our 4,300 members of staff work in many different settings including hospitals, clinics, prisons, secure hospitals, children’s centres, schools and people’s homes.

We have over 125 sites in a variety of locations in the South of England. In London we operate within the Boroughs of Bexley, Bromley Greenwich and into Kent. We manage hospital sites including Queen Mary’s Hospital, Sidcup and Memorial Hospital, Woolwich, as well as the Bracton Centre, our medium secure unit for people with mental health needs. We are the largest NHS provider of prison health services providing healthcare to prisons within Devon, Dorset, Bristol, Wiltshire and Gloucestershire, Kent and South London. We are proud of the care we provide and our people.

Our purpose is to improve lives by providing the best possible care to our patients and their families. This is strengthened by our new values:

- We’re Kind
- We’re Fair
- We Listen
- We Care
- Good listening skills and empathetic approach is necessary for this post.
- To log all calls with discussion details and with weekly updates with the Project assistant.
- To report any concerns to the Project assistant Volunteer Co-ordinator.
- Work within Oxleas policies, procedures and guidelines (PPG’s) by
- Ensuring confidentiality is adhered to at all times.
- Ensuring that actions and behaviour falls within the equal opportunities policy.
- Your own experience of mental health or having accessed services would be desirable.
- If for some reason you are no longer able to continue you will need to let the project assistant know at the earliest.
- All phones must be returned to the Trust at the end of the placement