Job summary

***This job advert will close as soon as sufficient applications have been received.***

The Clinical Support Technician is a specialist patient-facing role within the Prosthetics and Orthotics Service, providing advanced technical and clinical support to patients requiring prosthetic rehabilitation. The post holder manages an independent caseload, undertaking assessment, fault diagnosis, repair, maintenance, optimisation and manufacture of prosthetic devices to ensure patients can continue to use their prostheses safely and effectively.

Working autonomously within agreed protocols, the post holder provides direct clinical and technical interventions, supports planned preventative maintenance programmes, responds to emergency repairs, and contributes to rehabilitation outcomes through the optimisation of prosthetic function. The role requires specialist knowledge of prosthetic componentry, biomechanics, gait and skeletal alignment, together with highly developed practical skills in the manufacture, adjustment and repair of prostheses.

The post holder works as part of the multidisciplinary team, providing specialist technical advice to Prosthetists, Orthotists, Rehabilitation Engineers and other healthcare professionals. They are also responsible for supporting equipment safety, quality improvement, training, governance activities and the implementation of new technologies to ensure the delivery of a safe and high-quality service.

Main duties of the job

Manage an independent caseload of patients requiring prosthetic assessment, maintenance, repair, adjustment and optimisation. Assess, diagnose and resolve complex prosthetic and orthotic equipment issues, determining the most appropriate technical intervention to support patient rehabilitation. Manufacture, modify, fit, maintain and repair prosthetic devices using specialist technical skills and equipment. Deliver planned preventative maintenance clinics and undertake emergency repairs to ensure prosthetic devices remain safe and effective for patient use. Provide direct clinical and technical support to patients, carers and members of the multidisciplinary team. Apply specialist knowledge of biomechanics, gait analysis, skeletal alignment and prosthetic componentry to support patient outcomes. Maintain accurate patient records and service documentation using electronic patient record systems. Provide specialist technical advice to Prosthetists, Orthotists, Rehabilitation Engineers and other healthcare professionals. Support equipment safety, risk management, quality assurance, incident investigation and regulatory compliance activities. Lead and support service improvement projects, audits, equipment evaluations and the implementation of new technologies. Deliver training, supervision and competency assessments for technicians, apprentices and other staff members.

About us

West Midlands Rehabilitation Centre is a tertiary prosthetic centre, providing a full range of advice and prosthetic rehabilitation for all levels of upper and lower limb loss including paediatric services.

The centre is also one of the Veteran service centres, providing an enhanced service to veterans who have lost a limb in the service of their country.

The service is delivered at West Midlands Rehabilitation Centre and at two secondary centres located in Wolverhampton and Stoke-On-Trent, plus a small number of satellite clinics located across the region.

Be Part of Our Team...

BCHC has more than 5000 staff working across Birmingham and the West Midlands in a wide range of community nursing and specialist healthcare roles. BCHC delivers over 100 clinical services, in people's homes, health centres, clinics and inpatient facilities. We deliver a wide range of services for children, young people and families as well as adults and community services, two community hospitals, services for people with learning disabilities, the internationally recognised West Midlands Rehab Centre and one of Europe's leading Dental Hospitals and School of Dentistry. We deliver all of this with a commitment to integrated, personalised care that is rooted in our local communities. We have an ambition to deliver outstanding, integrated care as one of the key NHS providers in the West Midlands.

Job description

Job responsibilities

Please see attached job description and person specification for full details of the Clinical Support Technician position.

Person Specification

Qualifications / training

Essential

• Degree in Prosthetics & Orthotics, Rehabilitation Engineering, Clinical Technology, Biomedical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering or related discipline, or equivalent

Desirable

• Leadership or management qualification
• Quality improvement qualification
• Project management training.

Experience

Essential

• Significant experience in a technical service, delivering direct patient facing support, involving medical devices
• Proven experience of complex assembly with all major components and/or overhauling components
• Experience of autonomous decision-making in complex clinical-technical situations.

Desirable

• Proven experience of complex draping and laminating work
• Experience contributing to service development, audit, or quality improvement initiatives

Skills and knoweldge

Essential

• Managing challenging conversations with reassurance and professionalism
• Excellent communication skills, both written and verbal
• Skills of working in manufacturing environment, with good hand skills. Good use of hand tools (eg. drills, hammers etc.)
• IT skills to enable update of patient records and analysis of equipment software

Desirable

• Advance knowledge of manual handling processes and risk assessments for the management of loads, integral to the daily workflows

Additional information

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Certificate of Sponsorship

Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).

From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).