Children's Community Nurse | Dorset County Hospital NHS Foundation Trust


Company:	Dorset County Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
Salary:	£39,959 - £48,117 Per Annum
Hours:	Part-time
Location:	Dorchester, DT1 2LB
Job type:	Permanent
Posting date:	10 Sept 2026
Closing date:	10 Oct 2026

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Summary

We are delighted to offer an exciting opportunity for an experienced and motivated Band 6 Children's Community Nurse to join our established, friendly and supportive team.

The team provides high-quality child and family centred care to children and young people (CYP) with acute, chronic, complex and life-limiting needs.

This is a varied and rewarding role, providing the opportunity to work closely with CYP and their families in their own homes and community settings. The successful candidate will provide specialist clinical care, work autonomously and collaboratively across professional boundaries.

The role offers the individual the opportunity to develop specialist knowledge and skills while making a meaningful difference to children and families, supporting them to receive high quality care in the community where possible.

UKVI Sponsorship:This role is eligiblefor sponsorship under the Skilled Worker route, as defined by UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI). We welcome applications from individuals who require sponsorship to work in the UK. Sponsorship will be offered subject to meeting UKVI eligibilitycriteria.

You will be responsible for the assessment, planning, delivery and evaluation of care, working autonomously and as part of a multidisciplinary team to support children and young people to remain safely at home and avoid unnecessary hospital admissions.

The role requires excellent clinical, communication and leadership skills and a commitment to delivering high-quality, child and family-centred care.

You will provide specialist clinical interventions and deliver training and support to families, carers and education staff in areas such as enteral feeding, gastrostomy, tracheostomy and respiratory care.

You will work closely with a range of professionals and agencies to coordinate care, contribute to safeguarding processes, develop individualised care plans and promote positive outcomes for children and their families.

The successful candidate will also support junior staff and students, contribute to service development and quality improvement initiatives, and participate in the Children's Community Nursing end of life on-call rota.

At DCHFT, we pride ourselves on the care we provide for our patients, and on the culture, we are creating for our staff. We work hard to create a fair, inclusive environment for our staff.

Our Mission is to provide outstanding care for people in ways which matter to them, and our vision is Dorset County Hospital, working with our health and social care partners, will be at the heart of improving the well-being of our communities.

We are a Trust that celebrates diversity, and we are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees. We welcome applications from people in all under-represented groups.

We understand that AI can be a useful tool when completing your application. However, we are seeing an increasing over-reliance of AI tools, which can negatively affect your application as it reduces a candidate’s individuality, and makes it difficult for us to gain a clear and authentic understanding of your experience, skills, and in turn your suitability for the role.

All submissions must be truthful and if you do use AI, it should only be used to enhance your application and not create your supporting statement in its entirety. Your supporting statement should be in your own words and must accurately reflect your personal experience and achievements. Where we have concerns that AI has been used to generate content that misrepresents your experience and suitability for the role, we may withdraw your application.

· To make clinical judgements based on skilled assessment, planning, implementing and monitoring of the child in the community settingwith a nursing need, categorised into four main groups (Department of Health, 2011)

1. Children with acute and short-term conditions

2. Children with long-term conditions

3. Children with disabilities and complex conditions.

4. Children with life-limiting and life-threatening conditions.

· To facilitate and provide safe and effective care in the community, working in partnership with the child/young person, family/caregivers and the multidisciplinary team, to ensure family centred care in the most appropriate setting.

· To work autonomously as well as part of a team/integrated agency approach in provision of high quality, evidenced based care.

· To escalate situations to the appropriate professional or service, where there are a number of complicated aspects to take into account and a solution is difficult to identify. This may include advanced clinical assessment needing specialist medical review, requirement for specialist equipment to support a clinical need, additional support from a socio-economic perspective.

· To analyse any concerns raised by the child/young person (CYP) and family or caregiver and resolve/signpost this accordingly. This may include an event, problem encountered with equipment, or recognition of signs and symptoms that require patient assessment and/or specialist management

· The post holder is required to make judgements based on complex facts or situations requiring analysis, interpretation and comparison of a range of options. This could involve assessing events, problems, illness or complex needs via patient assessment, to determine the appropriate course of action.

· The post holder is accountable for provision of any aspects of nursing care and advice given directly to CYP, family/carers in accordance with the NMC code of conduct.

· The post holder will work in partnership with consultants and specialists to provide evidence-based, child specific training of clinical care to CYP, parents and school carers in accordance with professional accountability and delegation (NMC). This will include assessment of basic observations and escalation of concerns, enteral feeding and stoma care, tracheostomy care, management of respiratory conditions, to include oxygen, nebulised therapy and suction.

· To be included in the core ‘on-call’ End of Life (EoL) care rota in accordance with local protocol, supporting junior staff and liaising with the multi-professional team as appropriate this will include out of normal hours working incorporating nights and weekends.

· To support and assess consultant and specialist-led requests for equipment and supplies in the community, discussing this as appropriate with the budget holder and/or signposting to the responsible service if required.

· To provide and receive complex and sensitive information concerning CYP and their families and liaise with the multidisciplinary health team, specialist tertiary centre, and other agencies including Social Services, Education, Commissioners and voluntary sector.

· Extensiveknowledge and understanding of communication barriers, recognising when appropriate skills of reassurance, empathy, counselling and negotiation are required through assessing level of communication with children and young people, using methods appropriate for their age, development, culture and needs.

· The post holder will deliver specialised care ensuring the needs and wishes of CYP and their families are paramount, documenting and sharing this appropriately.

· Ensure boundaries and safeguarding issues when utilising all types of media to communicate, including text messages and email.

· Participate in multi-agency/multi-disciplinary meetings as required, or provide a written report if appropriate to ensure accurate and up-to-date information is shared.

· · To be responsive with unplanned visit requests and accommodate these when possible, taking initiative by working dynamically as a team thus enabling care to be given in the community and avoid hospital admission or GP attendance..

· Facilitate multi-agency working and collaboration to increase referrals to the children’s community nursing team, both internally to DCH and externally.

· Be responsible for identification and prompt, appropriate action regarding concerns and issues of children’s safeguarding and welfare.

· Actively participate in safeguarding discussions, child in need meetings, child protection conferences and provision of written reports as required.

· Administer, monitor and manage medicines safely in accordance with Trust policy, including controlled drugs and complex medication regimes.

· To have extensive knowledge of national policy and drivers within children’s community nursing, interpreting and supporting local development to ensure a high quality and sustainable service for CYP and their families.

· To extend the knowledge of the local children’s community nursing team model and multi-disciplinary-team, enhancing collaborative working with shared goals, demonstrating leadership and management skills.

· The post-holder will work with management to support the development of the infrastructure and resources required to facilitate expansion of actual and virtual patient contact. This will include:

Ø Attending MDT ward rounds/handover to identify children to ambulate and raise awareness of the service.

Ø Support MDT with children already on the CCN caseload or with chronic and complex conditions who may require MDT discussion.

Ø Use specialist knowledge and expertise to identify child specific needs and support the MDT to appoint an appropriate keyworker/buddy for ongoing care needs and training requirements.

Ø Ensure CYP and family/carer has timely access to internal and external agencies who will support their journey.

Ø Utilise appropriate technology for internal and external use ensuring safe, quality and timely assessment and documentation of CYP in accordance with Trust protocol.

· The post holder is required to introduce and support evidence-based care and proposals for change within their specialist domain in order to advance/establish evidence-based, quality care and role-model behaviour.

· Contribute to service evaluation and development initiatives alongside Trust colleagues and commissioners.

· The post holder will ensure mandatory training remains current as required by the Trust.

· The post holder will ensure any appropriate training and development required for their role is achieved in recognition with national and local guidance.

· The post holder is required to supervise or manage students in accordance with appropriate mentorship qualification or equivalent.

· The post holder is required to supervise new or less experienced staff, including clinical and non-clinical staff and students and provide training as appropriate.

· The post holder will maintain their own clinical supervision and ensure they receive 1:1’s as required with line manager.

· The post holder is required to record clinical observations, test results and patient care, signposting appropriately in accordance with Trust protocol and governance.

· The post holder is required to record personally and professionally generated information.

· The post holder will be required to maintain patient records both manually and electronically.

· The post holder is required to ensure any training required for the role is accessed and completed in a timely manner and remains current.

· Undertake surveys and audits as necessary to own work with occasional participation in research and development activity.

· The post holder is required to carry out physical skills that are normally obtained through practice, such as the use of cleaning of equipment after use at patient visits, driving and standard use of a computer/keyboard skills.

· The post holder will be involved with the manipulation of fine tools and/or materials and use appropriate restraint of CYP with approved methods. Dexterity and accuracy will be required for wound care, intravenous injection, including venepuncture with appropriate training, syringe pump/driver and infusion, insertion of catheters with relevant competency and removal of sutures.

· The post holder may be required to sit or stand in a restricted position due to provision of clinical care, such as dressing a wound, administering intravenous medication, taking blood and driving to community visits.

· There may be occasion where heavy equipment or multiple pieces of equipment are required for patient visits and an appropriate manual handling assessment needs to be completed.

· The working pattern is variable due to the responsive and reactive nature of community nursing.

· The post holder will be directly involved with children and their family with life limiting and life threatening conditions, who require palliative and/or end of life care.

· The post holder will be indirectly exposed to information about a situation and circumstance and directly exposed to a situation or patient and their family, which is emotionally demanding.

· The post holder will be expected to work as part of an on-call service providing end of life care, either in the community or on the ward as discussed with the family.

· The post holder may identify or be involved in recognition of child abuse, family breakdown situation or experience challenging behaviour.

· The post holder is expected to attend safeguarding and psychology supervision on a regular basis.

This advert closes on Thursday 24 Sep 2026

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