Cancer Support Worker Job Summary
The Cancer Support Worker role is funded by Macmillan Cancer Support. The Macmillan Cancer Support Worker will work as part of the personalised cancer care team supporting registered practitioners to improve holistic care for people with cancer. The postholder will support the provision of personalised cancer care interventions e.g. holistic needs assessments and health & wellbeing information/events. The postholder will be responsible for coordination of care to a specified group of cancer patients from the point of diagnosis and during their cancer treatment.The postholder will also coordinate care for a specified group of patients after their cancer treatment is complete, when they can be enabled to self-manage their follow-up care. The postholder will be required to work with clinical staff and administrative staff across all levels of seniority within the acute hospital setting. The Macmillan Cancer Support Worker will work very closely with the Cancer Clinical Nurse Specialists for a particular cancer type, e.g. breast cancer, bladder cancer, kidney cancer, upper gastro-intestinal cancer. The Macmillan Cancer Support Worker will need some prior experience working with cancer patients and excellent communication and organisational skills.
Cancer Support Worker Main Duties
JOB SUMMARY
The post holder will form an integral part of the personalised care team and will also be integrated into one tumour-specific clinical team, e.g. breast cancer, bladder cancer, kidney cancer, upper gastro-intestinal cancer etc, supporting the cancer clinical nurse specialists (CNS) for that tumour type in their roles.
Holistic Needs Assessment and Personalised Care/Support Planning
The cancer support worker will provide cancer patients with holistic signposting to information and support that meets their individual needs at that particular time, and in the right way for them. They will speak to patients to discuss what matters to them using an approved checklist tool (HNA).
Co-ordinate health education and wellbeing support for people living with and beyond cancer
The post holder will contribute to the organisation and delivery of health and well-being events (HWBE). These involve providing approved cancer information and signposting to support services and self-management resources.
Direct support to cancer clinical nurse specialists
The cancer support worker will provide general support to the allocated CNSs to enable them to focus specialist nursing skills on complex patients. This may include referrals to other agencies and important administration such as communicating with other teams within the hospital and within primary care / community services.
Person Specification
Royal Free World Class Values
Essential
- Demonstrable ability to meet the Trust Values
Education & professional Qualifications
Essential
- Educated to A level, and or NVQ Level 3 or 4 in Health and / or Social Care
- Committed to own professional development and evidence of regular attendance at training days
Experience
Essential
- Previous experience of working with cancer patients in a hospital environment
Desirable
- Previous experience of working in a multidisciplinary team
- Previous experience of customer care
- Experience of assessing patients physical, psychological and / or practical needs
- Experience of personalised cancer care
- Experience of patient diagnosis and treatment pathways
Skills and aptitudes
Essential
- Ability to communicate effectively with people of all levels, including communicating sensitive information to distressed people
- Ability to work flexibly, planning and reprioritize workload in light of unexpected events
- Competence in triage decision making, clinical escalation, and care priorities for a defined group of patients
- Confident and articulate when communicating with senior healthcare professionals
- Understanding of own limitations and role boundaries, and when to seek clinical advice and support
- Ability to use own judgement to problem solve and use initiative
- Ability to deal with distressing situations and high emotionality from patients and carers
- Skilled in use of IT (Email, MS Word, Excel, Powerpoint) and hospital systems
- Accuracy and attention to detail in data entry and report writing, and entries in medical records
Personal Qualities & Attributes
Essential
- Ability to form professional relationships with colleagues
- Caring, compassionate and professional nature
- Good listener and able to demonstrate empathy
- Flexible and adaptable to change
- Tactful and calm
- Approachable
Disclosure and Barring Service Check
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.
Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).
From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).
Closing Date: 08 April 2025
