Decontamination Technician

Responsibilities

• The post holder will undertake decontamination and sterilisation duties according to equipment requirements and assist the supervisors and managers in providing a high-quality accredited (EN ISO 13485:2016 & JAG) service, this will be inclusive of logistical responsibilities and store management processes of reusable medical devices utilised within clinical care, and the sterilisation of pathology waste.
• The post holder will be required to receive, disassemble, clean, disinfect, reassemble, pack, sterilise as appropriate, dispatch, transfer and store devices within controlled environments, ensuring comprehensive records of all tasks are maintained for tracking traceability purposes; this will necessitate the operation of specific computer and database applications.
• Because some tasks expected within this role are governed by regulation (UK MDR) the employee must work in accordance to national guidance and published research; the departments Standard Operating procedures and quality management systems to ensure an effective and compliant service is delivered.
• The role will be a rotational post working between sterile services, endoscopy decontamination services, SSD logistics, and theatre store and pathology decontamination. Reprocessing of surgical instrumentation, Endoscopes, theatre logistics and reprocessing waste in pathology decontamination.
• Inform senior staff if asked or expected to work unsupervised without the relevant training or level of competence.
• Attend training courses and partake in any other training strategies (mandatory and non‑mandatory) as required to maintain knowledge and skills; this may involve overnight stay away from home.
• Participate in own 1:1 meetings and PDP development.
• Assist with the supervision and teaching in decontamination practices to new and less experienced technicians.
• Support departmental needs to ensure monitoring, maintenance & servicing requirements of endoscopes and theatre instruments are undertaken in a way that offers little service disruption and report accordingly to senior staff.
• Ensure routine tests are undertaken and recorded in accordance with the Planned Preventative Maintenance Schedules, Quality Standards and Guidance.
• Undertake regular audits of decontamination and sterilisation processes and action any discrepancies to departmental guidelines.
• Adhere to the recommendations for the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health (COSHH) and relevant risk assessments appropriate to the clinical area.
• Inspect equipment within the decontamination cycle to ensure processes are effective.
• Recognise devices by name and ensure theatre trays and endoscopes are re‑packed correctly with correct instruments, ancillary items, and responsible for checking loan devices/trays and ensuring the correct items are delivered prior to clinical use.
• Attend and participate in departmental meetings.
• Support the development or refreshing of standard operating procedures in accordance with service change and modernisation.
• Will come into contact with remnants of blood, body tissue or offensive by‑products as part of the cleaning cycles.
• The role is physically demanding and requires significant amounts of manual handling.

Applicants who have not been contacted within 4 weeks of the closing date are to assume that their application has been unsuccessful.

Gateshead Health NHS Foundation Trust is a smoke‑free organisation in line with Smoke Free Gateshead.

All references from current and previous employers will be sought and MUST cover a minimum of 3 years employment or education references covering 3 years. If you have gaps you will be required to provide character references. Therefore, when completing the reference section of your application form, please give the address, telephone number and work email address of each of your current/previous line managers that cover 3 years employment or education references covering 3 years.

Where possible this should be from two separate employers. Failure to complete this section may result in your application not being processed.