Medical Laboratory Assistant - Cellular Pathology
Band 2
Main area Cellular Pathology Grade Band 2 Contract Permanent: Annex 20 position Hours
Part time
Flexible working
30 hours per week (Additional 1 in 6 Saturday morning rota.) Job ref 319-7258448AZ
Site North Tyneside General Hospital Town North Tyneside Salary £24,465 - £26,598 pro rata per annum Salary period Yearly Closing 06/07/2025 23:59
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.
Whilst Northumbria Healthcare are a highly innovative organisation, the use of Third Party Artificial Intelligence (AI) presents a risk to the integrity of our Recruitment & Selection processes. If you use AI, and it poses a risk to the integrity your individual recruitment process, we may withdraw your application at any stage of the process.
Job overview
The post holder will work effectively as part of a team providing histopathology, cytopathology and autopsy clinical technical services to Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust and local Primary Care Trusts.
They will perform a variety of technical, clerical and administrative duties that will facilitate the processing of patient samples for analysis to primarily assist in the differential diagnosis of cancer related disease.
The work involves handling biological samples and paperwork associated with this process therefore the departmental health and safety policies must be adhered to at all times.
They will support biomedical scientists and pathologists in the provision of an efficient diagnostic service and, apart from the assistant technical duties, much of this function involves in-depth use of IT software. The applicant should therefore be very familiar and comfortable with the use of computers.
Annex 20
This post falls within the provisions of Agenda for Change Annex 20 - Development of Professional Roles, whereby upon completion of an agreed set of competencies you may move onto the next pay band without the need for an application for a post at a higher level.
For further information on Annex 20, please see:
Please note that this vacancy will close once we have received a suitable number of applications
Main duties of the job
The main duties of the job role are split amongst two main areas of work; Within Specimen Reception the post-holder will receive and book-in human tissue samples (biopsies, organs, fluids), and assist the laboratory scientists in preparing the samples for automated processing. Within the Main Lab, the post-holder will (subject to experience and qualification) accurately embed tissues into wax blocks, sort blocks and paperwork, maintain laboratory equipment, collate microscope slides for quality control and operate the digital pathology slide scanners.
In addition to these varied roles, there are also general filing duties and stock receipt to perform.
The Cellular Pathology laboratory is based at North Tyneside General Hospital, serving Northumbria Specialist Emergency Care Hospital and the General Hospitals at Hexham, Wansbeck and North Tyneside. The department serves a population of approximately 550,000 encompassing both hospital and community.
The Dept comprises a small team of well-supported, busy, friendly staff, and uses a modern laboratory workflow to achieve excellent results for our Patients. The applicant should therefore be highly-motivated with great attention to detail, and should be an excellent team-player.
Working for our organisation
We manage three major locality hospitals at North Tyneside, Wansbeck and Hexham, plus a number of smaller community hospitals and clinics from Tynemouth to Berwick on Tweed, in addition to our state-of-the-art Northumbria Specialist Emergency Care Hospital, the first of its kind in England. We also care for people in their homes and provide services from facilities in local communities such as health centres. We give people greater choice and control over their care to help them to live independently at home and avoid hospital admission where appropriate. High quality patient care is at the heart of everything we do and we strive to ensure every single patient and service user has an exceptional experience with us. We have one of the most extensive patient experience programmes of any trust in England.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
The main duties of the job role are split amongst two main areas of work; Within Specimen Reception the post-holder will receive and book-in human tissue samples (biopsies, organs, fluids), and assist the laboratory scientists in preparing the samples for automated processing. Within the Main Lab, the post-holder will (subject to experience and qualification) accurately embed tissues into wax blocks, sort blocks and paperwork, maintain laboratory equipment, collate microscope slides for quality control and operate the digital pathology slide scanners.
In addition to these varied roles, there are also general filing duties and stock receipt to perform.
Person specification
Qualifications
Good basic literacy and numeracy skills
Post holders will be required to work towards a laboratory focused qualification such as Institute of Biomedical Scientists Certificate of Achievement Part 1
GCSE maths and English
ECDL / RSA or similar
Experience of Working in a medical Laboratory
Experience of data entry
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!
Certificate of Sponsorship
Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust proudly hold a sponsor licence. In order to provide sponsorship you and the role you are applying for must meet UKVI eligibility requirements. Please check your eligibility prior to submitting an application. Skilled Worker visa: Overview - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
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.
Employer certification / accreditation badges
The postholder will have access to vulnerable people in the course of their normal duties and as such this post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service to check for any previous criminal convictions.
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