Examples of volunteering roles: Ward Helper Volunteer

Ward Helper

Purpose:

Your role will be to provide support to patients and staff members during this time of increased pressure on NHS services due to Covid-19 (Coronavirus). As a volunteer you will be based on one of our adult inpatient wards. You will engage with patients as part of a large multi-disciplinary team of nurses, doctors and therapists. Although your role will not be clinical, you will have a key part to play as it provides the ward with an extra pair of hands, assisting with non-clinical tasks such as chatting to patients, distributing meals, making drinks and running errands for staff and patients.

You will be assigned to one of our inpatient wards depending on where the need is and on your availability.

Duties (what you will be doing):

• Befriending: spending time with patients who do not have many/any visitors. This could include playing games, reading or any other activity. Patients might also be elderly and like to reminisce – there are specific activities available on the ward for patients with dementia
• Helping patients to call and face time their families and friends
• Ensuring patient water jugs are full
• Escorting patients to different departments within the hospital for bloods tests, scans and x-rays as instructed by medical staff
• Support the nurses with pharmacy collections
• Providing patients and visitors with tea, coffee and other refreshments and ensuring water jugs are full
• Helping patients visit the Costa downstairs
• Brushing patients’ hair (only if you feel comfortable doing so)
• Fetching extra pillows or blankets for patients if they would like (checking with staff first)
• Assisting the physio team with patients recovery – although you are not expected to do any special lifting or use any specialist equipment or harnesses. This could include encouraging patients with their exercises
• Cleaning – this will only involve light cleaning such as keeping the day room tidy or some light dusting
• Bed changing
• Deliveries to and from the lab

You will also have a key role to play during mealtimes:

• Helping distribute the meals to patients
• Sitting with patients at meal times, to socialise and normalise eating and to encourage those who require it to try a little more food or fluid
• Sitting with patients who may need prompting to eat, such as those with dementia or those who need additional encouragement
• Ensuring that a patient can reach their food and fluids and utensils
• Assisting a patient by placing their food onto the fork or spoon for them to eat
• Assisting with cutting up of food or refilling of fluids
• Patient feeding – only with training and supervision
• Helping patients to brush their teeth after meals. This does not involve brushing their teeth for them. But some may need their toothbrush and toothpaste getting ready as they are recovering from strokes and may have weakness on one side

Boundaries (what you won’t be doing):

• No clinical care of patients
• No personal care (e.g. toileting or getting patients changed)
• No lifting of heavy equipment
• No feeding without training and supervision

Time commitment:

Each volunteering shift is 4 hours long. You must commit to at least one shift per week on any day of the week at one of the following times:

• 9 am to 1 pm
• 1 pm to 5 pm
• 5 pm to 9 pm
• 9 pm to 1 am
• 1 am to 5 am
• 5 am to 9 am

Requirements of the role:

Age: You must be 16 years or older to volunteer in this role

Accessibility: This role is accessible to people with wheelchairs or who have other mobility issues

As a volunteer you will embody the Trust’s values:

• Putting patients first
• Responsive to, and supportive of, patients and staff
• Open, welcoming and honest
• Unfailingly kind, treating everyone with respect, compassion and dignity
• Determined to develop our skills and continuously improve the quality of care

Skills and other requirements:

• You must be self-motivated; with an ability to think on your feet and work independently
• You must be punctual and dependable
• You must have a professional and friendly demeanour
• You must be flexible and eager to learn
• You need a thick skin. Some patients might be distressed, and seeing patients with delirium or dementia can be distressing for some
• This is not a job shadowing opportunity and should not be considered a work placement. You must be motivated to volunteer, rather than shadow clinical staff

For the full document please download the attachment.

You may also be interested in:

• Family Link Role Profile
• Ward support volunteers role description
• Winter Pressure Volunteer - Role Description and Risk Assessment

If you wish to share your knowledge on the Helpforce Connect, please visit this page (please note: the button "Contribute your resource" is only visible to logged in members).