Medical Examiner Officer

Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust's Medical Examiner (ME) Office is a key part of its mortality review process to support the implementation of national guidance on learning from deaths.
The successful post holder will support the MEs in their role in scrutinising the circumstances and causes of death to enable the Trust improve the experience of those patients who die in our care and the 'aftercare' of families/next of kin.
This is a clinically led department within the Clinical Support Business Unit.
We have ME Offices based at North Tyneside General Hospital, Wansbeck General Hospital and Northumbria Specialist Emergency Care Hospital.
This role will be rotational Trustwide with main base for the role at Wansbeck General Hospital., You will be a point of contact/advice for relatives of deceased patients, healthcare professionals, coroner and registration services. You will provide advice and support to junior doctors/nursing staff regarding the legal requirements relating to registration of death, completion of necessary investigations including referral to the Coroner's office and documentation for cremations. You will be responsible for the admin function of the ME service, accountable to the Operational Service Manager. You will be the first point of contact for bereaved relatives/carers, providing advice and support regarding the ME process and dealing with any concerns raised. You will collate information regarding performance of the ME service and any learning from investigations undertaken by the ME/Coroner., (1) The cause of death - to ensure that it is recorded accurately on the MCCD. This will minimise the potential for the registrar to decline to issue a certificate of death as a result of inappropriate or unacceptable descriptions on the MCCD and the resultant negative impact on the relatives of the deceased. They will be responsible for ensuring all relevant paperwork required by relatives is completed in a timely fashion, including additional paperwork associated with the ME process.
(2) Whether the death needs to be reported to the coroner - evidence from pilot sites and early adopters indicates that the implementation of an ME service reduces the number of inappropriate referrals to the coroner and improves the timeliness when a referral is required.
(3) Whether there are any clinical governance issues related to the death - early review of patient notes and discussions with relatives will allow timely identification of potential significant incident investigations.
The MEO will support the MEs in their role in scrutinising the circumstances and causes of death.
They will be a point of contact and source of advice for relatives of deceased patients, healthcare professionals and coroner and registration services.
The MEO will provide advice and support to junior doctors and nursing staff regarding the legal requirements relating to registration of death, completion of necessary investigations including referral to the Coroners office and documentation for cremations.
Applicants who are members of the Armed Forces, and those who have a disability that requires support in the work place (two ticks pledge) and who meet the essential criteria will be interviewed under the Trust's interview guarantee scheme.
We recognise the positive value of diversity and inclusion and are committed to a workforce that is diverse, equal and inclusive. We welcome and encourage job applications from people of all backgrounds. We particularly welcome applications from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) candidates as BAME people are currently under-represented in our workforce as well as other under-represented groups such as LGBT+ and disabled candidates. We are proud to be a Disability Confident Employer, a Stonewall Diversity Champion, we have a Gold award from the Defense Recognition Scheme, and we are delighted to support Apprenticeships, Age Posi+ive and are a mindful employer.
If you require any reasonable adjustments to attend interview please make the recruitment team aware as soon as possible by calling our HR Recruitment Team on option 2.
Applicants who meet the Fit and Proper Person Requirements (FPPR) will require additional pre-employment checks in line with CQC and NHS England statutory guidance.
Make sure to read the 'applicant guidance notes' before submitting your application and make sure you know everything there is to know before joining our fantastic trust!
After applying via NHS Jobs, your submitted application will be imported into our preferred Third party recruitment system. All subsequent information regarding your application will be generated from apps.trac.jobs. You will not be able to track the progress of your application or receive messages through the NHS Jobs website, and furthermore, that as an employer, we will not be able to respond to any e-mails sent to us via the NHS Jobs website. By applying for this post, you are agreeing to Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust transferring the information contained in this application to its preferred applicant management system. If you are offered a job information will also be transferred into the national NHS Electronic Staff Records system.
Please note that it is a requirement of this Trust that all successful applicants pay for their own DBS certification if a DBS check is required for the post. The method of payment is a salary deduction from your first monthly pay.

Do you want to work in one of the best performing NHS organisations in England? Work for an organisation that was voted the best acute and combined acute and community trust in the country, based on the experience of its staff (NHS Staff Survey 2022). Work in an organisation that supports its staff and focuses on staff experience as much as it does the experience of its patients? You can live and breathe in an area that has the cleanest air, cost effective living, great nightlife, some of the best schools with a wealth of history available on your doorstep. Sound too good to be true? Well it isn't, this is what you get when you work for Northumbria Healthcare and, this is…the Northumbria Way!
What the Northumbria Way means for you:
+ Extensive staff health and well-being programme including access to our specialist Wellbeing Hub
+ Support and connection through a variety of Staff Network groups
+ A range of flexible working opportunities
+ Generous annual leave and pension scheme
+ Access to lease car and home electronics scheme (qualifying criteria applies)
+ Opportunities to improve your professional development through our vast training programmes
+ On-site nursery places via salary sacrifice
+ Access to savings scheme via salary sacrifice with Northumberland Community Bank
We are proud to be one of the country's top performing NHS trusts - rated 'outstanding' overall by the Care Quality Commission (CQC). We provide a range of health and care services to support more than 500,000 people living in Northumberland and North Tyneside across the largest geographical area of any NHS Trust in England. Our teams deliver care from hospitals, a range of community venues and people's homes. Our hospitals include a specialist emergency care hospital (the first of its kind in England), three general hospitals and community hospitals. In the community we deliver a wide range of community and public health services.
We lead in innovation and quality, having opened the Northumbria Healthcare Manufacturing and Innovation Hub during the Covid-19 pandemic and have recently launched our Community Promise - a pledge to make a real impact not just in healthcare but on the wider factors that affect people's lives, such as education, employment and the economy.
If Northumbria Healthcare sounds like somewhere you could belong we would love to hear from you. Visit our website to catch up on our latest news.