Job overview

An exciting opportunity has arisen on Frailty Virtual Ward, for a Band 7 Clinical Nurse Specialist - Frailty.

Frailty Virtual Ward is a 45 bedded capacity community base service that aims to support patients, who would otherwise be in hospital, to receive acute care, and treatment they need in their own home or usual place of residence.  The post holder will be expected to support their team, department and organisation to achieve both trusts' values in their day-to-day work.  The role involves working very closely with the Acute Frailty and Virtual Ward multidisciplinary team (MDT) and is a pivotal role in ensuring all patients within the Virtual Ward receive the best possible care and service. This exciting post is available for a dynamic and experienced Nurse with an interest in the provision of care to patients suffering from frailty. You will be required to work autonomously across the BHR area liaising with the Acute Frailty & emergency departments as well as visiting patients in care homes and in the community, providing a range of services using your enhanced clinical assessment and treatment skills, to assess and manage patients. The virtual ward cares for patients who have been discharged from an Acute Hospital ward or the Emergency department, and also accepts patients for admission from primary care and other community-based providers. This will require staff with skills and understanding. The applicant needs to have a good knowledge base around the needs of all of these patients.  The applicant will be expected to  demonstrate excellent communication and motivational skills in order to continue the excellent team work currently displayed. Expectations will include continuing with creating a ward that is supportive to all staff but particularly those that are new and junior and to also continue to develop an environment of quality and innovation, encouraging independent thinking and creativity.

For further details / informal visits contact: Esther Harry – Service Manager  ([email protected]) or  If you are motivated, flexible and passionate about patient care , we would love to hear from you!

Interview Date: tbc

Informal visits to our departments are strongly encouraged

Main duties of the job

To obtain a patient history and establish a working diagnosis of an individual’s health condition.

Lead the design and implementation of best practice clinical pathways, care management, and care planning of people with frailty, as part of the Virtual Ward (VW) MDT

 Working in a patient-facing role to clinically assess and treat patients with frailty, using your expert knowledge of medicines for specific disease areas

Demonstrate high level clinical knowledge and advanced skills to undertake a remote assessment, including accurate clinical history, and/or perform a physical examination to formulate a differential diagnosis and devise, monitor and review evidence-based treatment plans and advice. This may be in a patient’s home or care home environment as required and may include lone working.

 Arrange services and support with other healthcare providers. Act as a referral agent by establishing multi agency collaboration across primary/ secondary interface to meet the needs of the patient, including social needs.

 Perform point of care testing and obtain supporting information to inform the assessment of an individual.

 Provide clinical interpretation from clinical investigations and determine a treatment plan for an individual.

Working for our organisation

We’re an organisation that is getting better and better and our improvements are driven by a determination to deliver care we’re proud of and our patients are happy with. We’re no longer in special measures; we’ve opened two new theatres at our Elective Surgical Hub in King George Hospital (KGH); and Matthew Trainer, our Chief Executive, has been named the top CEO by the Health Service Journal.

We operate from two main sites – KGH in Goodmayes and Queen’s Hospital in Romford. We have two busy emergency departments with more than 330,000 people visiting them last year. We’re campaigning to secure the £35m we need to transform the A&E at Queen’s and get rid of corridor care.

Our patients are benefitting from our Women’s Health Hub in Ilford; an Ageing Well Centre in Hornchurch; and Community Diagnostic Centres (CDC) at Barking Community Hospital and at St George’s Health and Wellbeing Hub in Hornchurch.

These CDCs are open 12 hours a day, 7 days a week and are providing an extra 88,000 scans a year. 

The majority of our 8,000 staff – who come from 146 different countries - live in the three diverse London boroughs we serve and are from black, Asian and minority ethnic groups. Many can work flexibly and more than 400 of them are on our Ofsted accredited apprenticeship programmes. We’re proud to be a London Living Wage employer.

We’re looking forward to introducing an electronic patient record that will be transformative for our staff and beneficial for our patients.