Job responsibilities

Job summary:

The Nurse Consultant in Palliative Care is a senior clinical leader with organisational responsibility for providing expert, autonomous practice, and nursing leadership, enabling high standards of safe, effective and compassionate care. Collaborating with the Medical Director, Medical Consultants and wider clinical teams, the role provides clinical leadership, education and supervision, strengthens professional practice and drives service transformation, quality improvement and equitable access to care.

The Nurse Consultant leads the development of specialist practice, clinical standards including policy, guidelines and procedures, workforce development, research and evidence-based care. In addition, the Nurse Consultant holds clinical supervision responsibilities for specialty grade doctors, advanced practitioners and non-medical prescribers. The Nurse Consultant works alongside external partners and multi-disciplinary teams to influence system-wide service quality to improve patient outcomes, demonstrating the hospice values.

Safeguarding responsibilities:

To demonstrate a commitment to keeping adults and young people safe

To report any disclosure made to you to the appropriate person.

To report any safeguarding concerns in the workplace to the appropriate person

To maintain an awareness of the hospices policies in relation to safeguarding

Key responsibilities:

Expert Clinical Practice

To directly manage care of patients and carers with specialist palliative care needs for no less than 60% of their job plan.

Expert clinical Assessment and Management:

o Provides autonomous expert assessment and management of patients with complex specialist palliative and end-of-life care needs.

o Undertakes holistic assessment and applies advanced clinical reasoning to determine appropriate, evidence-based interventions.

o Develops, implements, and evaluates individualised care plans in partnership with patients, families and the multidisciplinary team.

o Leads the management of the most complex and challenging clinical situations across all settings in which the hospice provides services

Analyse and synthesise highly complex clinical and non-clinical information, including investigation results, to inform safe, timely and evidence-based decisions.

Support and empower colleagues across the multidisciplinary team to provide patient centred care through a collaborative approach,

Act as a recognised clinical expert within specialist palliative and end of life care, maintaining visibility, accessibility, and credibility in practice as part of a flexible and dynamic medical team consisting of Medical Consultants, Nurse consultants, specialty grade doctors and resident doctors.

Maintain professional, legal and ethical accountability for all aspects of practice, working in accordance with the NMC Code, hospice, local and national policies, and organisational values.

Provide expert advice, second opinion and clinical consultation to nursing, medical, allied health professional and wider multidisciplinary colleagues.

Promote shared decision-making with patients, families, and carers, taking account of mental capacity, consent, preferences, diversity, dignity and individual values.

Provide authoritative expertise in pain and symptom management, prognosis, quality of life, treatment escalation, withdrawal or withholding of treatment, and end of life decision-making within an ethical framework.

Work as a Non-Medical Prescriber improving timely access to medication and ensuring safe prescribing, supply and administration in line with hospice policy.

Collaborate with the multidisciplinary team to support safe, effective and timely admission, discharge, transition and continuity of care.

Support generalist and specialist colleagues to develop competence in palliative and end of life care through education, supervision, advice, consultation, and role modelling.

Facilitate the development of nursing and clinical practice across all hospice related services including inpatient, outpatient, and community in response to patient, workforce, and service need.

Promote evidence-based and research-informed practice, linking clinical development to governance, quality improvement, and patient safety agendas.

Identify, lead and support service improvement initiatives that enhance access, experience, outcomes, and quality of palliative care provision.

Develop, establish, and implement care pathways, guidelines and practitioner-led initiatives, particularly where precedents do not exist.

Engage with all requirements for appraisal and revalidation, including continuous professional development which will be supported by access to paid study leave.

Leadership Capabilities

Work with the Medical Director, Medical Consultants, and other clinical leads to develop and implement the Hospices strategic clinical plan, annual business plans and service level agreements.

Provide expert clinical, professional and values-based leadership across the organisation, including direct clinical leadership of Advanced Practice and Non-Medical Prescribing. Lead on Hospice Non-Medical Prescribing governance and workforce development.

Provide line-management to Speciality Grade Doctors, support with professional development, coaching, and oversight of clinical practice.

Lead strategic development, service improvement, inquiry, and innovation across palliative and end of life care, using evidence, standards, audit, outcome measures and best practice to inform decision-making.

Identify areas for service improvement, work with stakeholders and service users, propose and project manage change, and evaluate the impact on care quality, experience, safety, and service effectiveness.

Contribute to hospice governance processes, prescribing governance, medicines management, risk management, complaints management, policy development and standards within the Hospice and wider locality.

Act as an expert resource and provide advice, consultancy and leadership on standards relating to specialist palliative and end of life care.

Create a culture of effectiveness, inclusiveness, excellence and respectful relationships, supporting high-performing palliative care teams and good places to work where people from all backgrounds can excel.

Provide a strong and visible leadership presence, building open, trusting, and respectful relationships with internal and external partners.

Act as an effective role model, demonstrating self-awareness, emotional intelligence, courage, and commitment to speaking up for patients, families, service users and staff.

Support professional development, mentorship, coaching, recruitment, role development, and feedback processes across clinical teams.

Support formal and informal team building, chair meetings effectively and contribute as a core member of the Medical Team.

Build and maintain networks of leaders and sustainable partnerships across organisations, sectors, and systems, including regional, national and international links where appropriate.

Actively involve key partners, commissioners, senior leaders, staff and service users in creating a shared vision that responds to current and future population needs across health and social care.

Represent the hospice on relevant groups and at meetings where expert nursing leadership in specialist palliative care is required.

Promote and facilitate evidence-based practice by keeping up to date with developments in nursing, advanced practice, and palliative care.

Utilise clinical outcomes measures such as the OACC suite, and a range of clinical and activity data to demonstrate effectiveness and drive improvement.

All new consultants can be mentored by an established consultant within the organisation or by one of the consultants from the neighbouring Palliative Care service providers to enable them to settle into the post and to support them in their initial years as a consultant. Established consultants will also have access to mentoring or support as needed.

Education

Provide expert education and training to patients, carers, nurses, healthcare professionals, and wider stakeholders, adapting teaching to diverse levels of knowledge, experience and learning needs.

Identify learning and development needs across clinical teams and the wider workforce, contributing to induction, training programmes, professional development, and career pathways.

Create a culture of learning and continuous improvement through experiential learning, reflective practice, peer learning, clinical supervision, mentoring, and shared learning.

Lead and develop the Advance Practice workforce including governance, supervision, and mentorship of Advanced Practitioners.

Provide direct and indirect clinical supervision to resident doctors and medical students whilst on placement at the hospice.

Act as a professional resource and expert educator for palliative and end-of-life care, providing clinical advice and developing the capability and confidence of others, including through effective educational partnerships with our connected higher education institutions and training providers,

Use findings from internal and external clinical governance activity, alongside research and user feedback to inform and develop the Medical Teams and the hospices education programmes and quality improvement activity.

Disseminate and contributes to professional knowledge, through research, publications, conference presentations, posters, and other professional forums, acting as a recognised local, regional and national resource in palliative and end-of-life care.

Qualifications

Essential

• Current NMC Level One Registration
• MSc Palliative Care/Advanced Clinical Practice
• Advanced Clinical Assessment Skills
• Non-medical Prescribing
• Advanced Communication Skills

Desirable

• Teaching qualification
• PHD or willingness to work towards
• Leadership Qualification

Specific Skills

Essential

• Able to undertake audit and research, independently or with others.
• Excellent presentation skills.
• Able to analyse highly complex facts and situations.
• IT literate and good office skills.
• Clean driving license and access to own vehicle.

Personal Qualities

Essential

• Approachable and calm.
• Imaginative and problem solver.
• Enjoys challenges.
• Strong leadership values.
• Able to work flexibly and be adaptable.
• Team player.

Experience

Essential

• Minimum 5 years experience working at a senior level in specialist palliative care or similar specialty.
• Highly developed specialist knowledge underpinned by theory and experience.
• Experience in teaching and supervision.
• Experience of leading service development, projects and change management.
• Experience in conducting clinical audit.
• Experience in writing procedures and standards.

Desirable

• Experience in strategic planning.
• Academic interest.
• Experience in presenting at conferences.
• Published journal articles.

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.

UK Registration

Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).