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Detailed job description and main responsibilities

About University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust

University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust is the largest hospital in the Southwest peninsula and a major trauma centre, providing comprehensive secondary and tertiary healthcare.

Our geography gives us a secondary care catchment population of 450,000 with a wider peninsula population of almost 2,000,000 people who can access our specialist services. The population is characterised by its diversity – the rural and the urban, the wealthy and pockets of deprivation, and wide variance in health and life expectancy. Population ageing is a recognised national trend, but is exacerbated locally by the drift of younger people out of the area and older people in. The proportion of our population aged 85 or over is growing ahead of the national average by approximately 10 years and we have developed a Population Health Strategy in response to this demographic shift.

We work within a network of other hospitals to offer a range of specialist services:

•             Kidney transplant

•             Pancreatic cancer surgery

•             Neurosurgery

•             Cardiothoracic surgery

•             Bone marrow transplant

•             Upper Gastro-intestinal surgery

•             Hepatobiliary surgery

•             Neonatal intensive care and high-risk obstetrics

•             Plastic surgery

•             Liver transplant evaluation

•             Stereotactic radiosurgery

FUTURE STRATEGY AND VISION

Derriford Hospital opened in 1981 and has gradually expanded to replace the four major acute hospitals in Plymouth in existence at that time.  The site was chosen just outside the city limits to facilitate this expansion.  The availability of adjacent land has permitted the development of a ’Medical City’ as local planners concentrate medical developments within this area.  Specifically, the acquisition of land has enabled the following developments to take place:

·               A science park adjacent to the Hospital that includes the Diving Diseases Research Centre, Medical Innovations Centre and the relatively new Undergraduate Medical School buildings.

·               A rehabilitation unit dedicated to the treatment of neurological and orthopaedic rehabilitation.

·               The construction of the state-of-the-art Terence Lewis Building which houses the Southwest Cardiothoracic and Vascular Centre with full critical care facilities, library, research and teaching facilities.

·               The Radiology academy (a Department of Health initiative) which provides full facilities for teaching and training in radiological diagnosis and treatment.

·               New residential buildings for hospital staff.

·               A new dialysis unit located close to but not within the hospital grounds to facilitate ease of access and parking for these patients.

·               The Future hospital project – aimed at construction of the state-of-the art emergency department, Radiology department and operating theatres including dedicated Neuro-hybrid theatre and vascular hybrid theatres. The project planned to be completed by end of 2026.

The Trust is a cancer centre and major trauma centre for the Southwest Peninsula.

The South West Cardiothoracic Centre provides a service for patients who previously had to travel substantial distances for treatment elsewhere in the United kingdom.  With continual expansion the centre performs in excess of 1500 open heart procedures per year.  

The Trust provides tertiary services (neurosurgery, maxillofacial surgery, plastic surgery, cardiac and thoracic surgery, transplantation, radiotherapy and oncology) for a population of up to 2 million people living in Devon, Cornwall and Dorset.

The Trust has laid out 5-year and 10-year strategy with focus on creating regional network with Cornwall to increase patient volumes given the published evidence linking volumes and outcomes in vascular surgery (POVS 2021). Our published data prior to COVID19 is in line with VS recommendations in the Provision of Vascular Services. The “Future hospital project” has hybrid vascular theatre incorporated in the plan and we hope to get this ready by 2026. 

Central funding has also been secured for the CDC development which will encompass 2 CT, 2 MR, 2 plain film and 4 ultrasound suites providing diagnostic services in the centre of Plymouth. This is also due to open in September 2025 and will provide dedicated consultant office and reporting space in a purpose-built city-centre environment.

For more information, please visit the Trust’s website at http://www.plymouthhospitals.nhs.uk

The work of the department

The Radiology department at UHPT is a large teaching department responsible for specialist registrar training. Derriford Hospital is a large Teaching Hospital providing secondary and tertiary care to a population of 1.7 million. It is a busy Trauma centre. The main x-ray service is accommodated within two large adjacent departments, and a third smaller one in A&E.

The trust has a full Insignia PACS service connected to all Imaging modalities, installed in 2013. There is Voice Recognition integrated to the Radiology Information System (Wellbeing RIS with Dragon VR). Both PACS and RIS are shared systems operating across the South-West Peninsula, allowing for near seamless image sharing between the trust and neighbouring hospitals.

We have a mature remote system established, with many consultants working at least 50% of their time from home with full PACS workstations and secure routers to emulate on-site reporting. We would be open to discussions about remote working to suit applicants who did not wish to fully relocate to the Southwest.

Reporting of inpatient and ED imaging is provided on an extended working day basis by radiology consultants (9am – 7pm), with radiology registrars providing out-of-hours cover 9pm – 9am with both neuroradiology and general radiology consultants providing non-resident on call.  Weekends are fully staffed by radiology registrars, again with both neuroradiology and general radiology consultants providing non-resident on call. In addition, 7 day working has been established with daily inpatient ultrasound and additional low-acuity CT reporting being provided by consultants.

The current frequency of general on call is approximately 1 in 18. Diagnostic neuroradiology on call is 1:8.

GENERAL WORKLOAD          

Proposed Job Plan: to be reviewed at 1 year

ON CALL

There are 1.5 generic SPA’s within the job plan. These are to support personal development, audit, teaching and non-clinical administration. Job plans will be reviewed annually to determine the addition of further SPAs to support trust approved additional activities. An additional 1 non-generic SPA is available on request to support specific aspects of professional and service development.