Speech and Language Therapy Assistant Practitioner


Company:	Colchester Hospital University NHS Foundation Trust
Salary:	£28,392 - £31,157 per annum pro rata
Hours:	Full-time
Location:	Ipswich, IP4 5PD
Job type:	Permanent
Posting date:	21 Sept 2026
Closing date:	21 Oct 2026

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Summary

A Vacancy at East Suffolk and North Essex NHS Foundation Trust.

We have an exciting opportunity to become an assistant practitioner in our friendly, innovative speech and language therapy (SLT) service, based in the community team in East Suffolk.

Community SLT is part of a wider, integrated SLT service in East Suffolk which supports people with communication and swallowing difficulties in their own home, in care homes, in clinic for outpatient appointments, and on the inpatient wards at Ipswich Hospital. You may be asked to work flexibly across these service areas. We are currently enhancing our working with other health workers with our Integrated Neighbourhood Team colleagues.

The service champions innovation and quality improvement, and are committed to developing leadership skills for staff at all levels. We have won awards for our innovation, for example the ‘Making Better Use of our Resources’ award at the Suffolk and North East Essex Can Do Health and Care awards.

This is a varied role and responsibilities will include supporting our speech and language therapists with assessments, delivering therapy plans, leading groups and supporting training for a mixed caseload of people with a range of swallowing and communication difficulties. This could include people who have difficulties communicating after a stroke, or someone who has slurred speech or a quiet voice due to a neurological condition, for example. Our assistants play a vital role in carrying out rehabilitation and therapy exercise plans. The role also involves supporting families and carers.

We are ESNEFT and we provide hospital and community health services to almost one million people across east Suffolk and north Essex. Our dedicated staff deliver care from acute hospitals in Colchester and Ipswich, community hospitals, surgeries, community clinics and in patients’ own homes.

We are one of the largest NHS organisations in England, employing more than 12,000 staff.

We pride ourselves on supporting our staff. We offer a wide range of training and development opportunities, as well as flexible working options.

Along with supporting you to achieve your career goals we offer a generous pension scheme, unsocial hours payments (where applicable), 27 days annual leave on commencement (pro rata) and access to a range of NHS discounts. Our Staff Health and Wellbeing programme offer a variety of services.

Our philosophy is that Time Matters to everyone. Across the Trust, we concentrate on improving the things we do and removing those which cause time delays for our staff and patients.

We are investing in our commitment to Time Matters with a partnership with leading electronic patient record (EPR) supplier Epic. This digital transformation will bring what’s widely regarded as the world’s best EPR system to ESNEFT, transforming life in hospital for staff and patients.

If you are passionate about patient care and want to develop your skills and knowledge, then we want to hear from you.

Find out about living and working here - www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkPu7HphU8A

For full details of the responsibilities and dutiesof this role please see the attached job description.

This advert closes on Wednesday 30 Sep 2026

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