PALS Officer

+ To act as an accessible and clear first point of contact for patients and members of the public when there are queries and concerns about services provided by the Trust.
+ Record accurate records details of concerns onto Trust database, using relevant Trust systems to check and confirm information.
+ as a representative of the Trust, and in accordance with Trust values and behaviours, effectively handle feedback and concerns, and act as a coordinator in ensuring concerns are addressed.
+ Assist in highlighting trends and themes received through feedback and concerns to contribute towards a learning organaisation, ensuring continuous patient experience improvement., + Ensure that concerns raised by service users are acted upon promptly and passed to the most appropriate senior member of staff for resolution.
+ Documentation and information is effectively managed and exchanged with care, accuracy and sensitivity, maintaining confidentiality.
+ Respond appropriately to the emotionally demanding aspects of dealing with patients/carers in distress, or with any unpredictable aggressive behaviour displayed by patients/carers/relatives unhappy about some aspect of their care or trust service.
+ Highly sensitive telephone and personal enquiries are dealt with promptly, effectively, sensitively and appropriately.
+ Ability to cope with highly emotional service users who can display unpredictable and/or aggressive behaviour.
+ Provide help to patients, carers and families in accessing Trusts services, local and specialist advocacy services, or other voluntary services including interpreting services as appropriate.
+ Build and maintain excellent working relationships with clinical and non-clinical staff across divisions, departments and with external organisations to gain public and professional confidence.
Please see attached job description for full details as well as Person Specification. These documents set out the roles and responsibilities in full.

An exciting opportunity has arisen for an enthusiastic and innovative individual to join our team as a PALS Officer!
We are looking for a motivated individual with excellent communication, interpersonal and organisational skills. In this post, you will join a team that aims to resolve concerns quickly and efficiently and uses the feedback obtained to influence and improve the patient experience across the Trust. Dealing with highly sensitive situations on a daily basis, you will work with patients, relatives and staff to ensure that concerns are resolved and improvement is embedded. From their unique perspective, PALS officers play a key role in sharing patient insight to aid continuous improvement, supporting the delivery of safe care along with an excellent patient experience.
We are looking to appoint an individual who is compassionate and kind and who has the right values and behaviours to provide an excellent service. We would expect this individual to be enthusiastic, motivated, showing sensitivity and tact and be able to demonstrate excellent communication and interpersonal skills. Resilience is necessary to be able to deal with upsetting and stressful situations. The right candidate should be able to demonstrate an ability to manage conflict, mediate between parties to resolve problems and work with people from a diverse range of backgrounds.

Mid and South Essex NHS Foundation Trust is now one of the largest trusts in the country, serving a population of 1.2 million people. Our newly formed Trust, comprising acute hospital sites at Broomfield in Chelmsford, Basildon and Southend, is determined to provide the best health services for its local population. We are a well-led, high-performing and innovative organisation working in the best interests of the people we serve., Working for our organisation
With a workforce of approximately 15,000 staff, we can now do more and go further in delivering health services to our local communities.
Our ambition is to deliver excellent local and specialist services, to improve the health and wellbeing of our patients, and provide a vibrant place for staff to develop, innovate and build careers.
Patients will experience improved care as well as fewer delays and cancellations. We are able to provide more once-in-a-lifetime specialist care region-wide. With our new trust size will come more opportunities for development, research, networking and innovation.
We aim to make the most of our skills and experiences so we can become the best we can be. As one organisation we will recruit the finest and retain more specialist staff due to more employment opportunities across our Trust.