Speech and Language therapist Dysphagia lead

An exciting opportunity has arisen for an experienced Speech and Language Therapist to take on a new Dysphagia Pathway Lead role. This newly created post offers the opportunity to shape and develop our dysphagia pathway across Iris Care Group, providing specialist clinical leadership and supporting safe, consistent and high-quality dysphagia practice. Working across our hospital services and Beechwood College, you will work collaboratively with multidisciplinary teams, provide specialist advice, support staff development and competency, and help drive quality improvement across services., You will:

• Provide specialist assessment and management of complex eating, drinking and swallowing (EDS) difficulties.
• Lead the development and implementation of a consistent, evidence-based dysphagia pathway across our services.
• Provide expert advice and clinical leadership for complex and high-risk dysphagia cases.
• Support the management of choking, aspiration and other dysphagia-related risks.
• Provide clinical supervision, advice and support to Speech and Language Therapists and wider multidisciplinary teams.
• Deliver dysphagia training and support staff competency development.
• Lead and contribute to clinical audit, quality improvement, governance and service development.
• Work closely with internal multidisciplinary teams and external NHS and specialist services.
About us The postholder will lead the development, implementation and ongoing evaluation of a consistent, safe and evidence-based dysphagia pathway across the four services, ensuring that individuals with eating, drinking and swallowing difficulties receive timely assessment, intervention, review and risk management. The role combines a specialist clinical caseload with leadership, clinical governance, training, supervision, audit and service development responsibilities. The postholder will act as a source of specialist dysphagia expertise for the wider multidisciplinary team and provide professional support and advice to Speech and Language Therapists, nursing teams, care/support staff, education teams, catering colleagues and other relevant professionals. The role will support consistent application of the organisation's choking and dysphagia policy. Iris policy identifies SLTs as having a key role in identifying and managing dysphagia across developmental, neurological and physical disorders.