Healthcare Support Worker | Oxleas NHS Foundation Trust

We are seeking to employ several motivated individuals to the role of Healthcare Assistants at Band 3 level for our Forensic Inpatient Directorate (Bracton Centre and Memorial Hospital).

Previous experience in healthcare is not necessary as full training will be provided, but applicants must possess a positive attitude to mental health, recovery, and social inclusion.

We are a Trauma Informed Service, looking for dynamic and compassionate individuals.

We are seeking to recruit people who are curious about the ways that adversity and traumas impact our patients’ behaviours, functioning, clinical presentations and engagement.

You will be supported to deliver high quality care to patients, in which your relational skills will help our patients to feel safe, listened to, valued, engaged and empowered.

You will be supported to be trauma responsive, developing practices that avoid causing further harm, promote engagement and create a safe context for healing and recovery.

You will have access to multiple sources of support, including supervision, training, staff support sessions and working alongside colleagues from multiple professional disciplines (e.g., psychologists, occupational therapists, nurses, social workers, medics and administrators).

Bracton Lane, off Leyton Cross Road, Dartford, Kent, DA2 7AF

Memorial Hospital, Shooters Hill, London SE18 3RZ

**Important Sponsorship Information for this post: We are currently unable to offer a certificate of sponsorship for this post**
The job is designed to introduce staff who have little or no experience of caring work, but who demonstrate the values of the organisation and passionate about patient care.


Healthcare assistants provide hands on personalised care to service users, always under supervision, and with the support of more senior staff. You will use your skills to create safety, support emotional regulation, reframe frustrating behaviours and reflect on your own practice.

The job is designed to help the post holder gain clinical experience, under close and supportive supervision, and to ensure our service users and carers receive care from people with the right values. We are keen to recruit applicants who recognise the importance of fostering safety, trustworthiness & transparency, peer support, collaboration, empowerment & choice, and attending to cultural, historical & gender issues.

You will work as part of a multi-disciplinary team, where good communication supports the management of clinical and risk issues on the ward. You will be part of a service that is focussed on re-emphasising how focus on relationships and communication keep people physically and psychologically safe within in the forensic setting, such as providing patient choice, when possible, collaboration and transparency.

Oxleas offers a wide range of NHS healthcare services to people in community and secure environment settings. Our services include community health care such as district nursing and speech and language therapy, care for people with learning disabilities and mental health care such as psychiatry, nursing and therapies. Our multidisciplinary teams look after people of all ages and we work in close partnership with other parts of the NHS, local councils and the voluntary sector and through our new provider collaboratives. Our 4,300 members of staff work in many different settings including hospitals, clinics, prisons, secure hospitals, children’s centres, schools and people’s homes.We have over 125 sites in a variety of locations in the South of England. In London we operate within the Boroughs of Bexley, Bromley Greenwich and into Kent. We manage hospital sites including Queen Mary’s Hospital, Sidcup and Memorial Hospital, Woolwich, as well as the Bracton Centre, our medium secure unit for people with mental health needs. We are the largest NHS provider of prison health services providing healthcare to prisons within Devon, Dorset, Bristol, Wiltshire and Gloucestershire, Kent and South London. We are proud of the care we provide and our people.Our purpose is to improve lives by providing the best possible care to our patients and their families. This is strengthened by our new values:• We’re Kind
• We’re Fair
• We Listen
• We Care

• Working under the direct supervision and guidance of a Registered Nurse/ Senior Health Care Support Worker/ Assistant Practitioner/Nurse Associate to support the delivery of quality nursing care, contributing to the physical, psychological, social, recreational, and spiritual care in a recovery focused and trauma-informed way, through therapeutic engagement and activities, and taking steps to address any issues that arise.
• Undertaking activities to ensure that the fundamentals of care are met - such as physical and psychological safety, emotional and social support, nutrition, hydration, hygiene and comfort.
• Offering patient-centred care, offering choices and opportunities to empower patients whenever possible.
• Providing hands-on care to service users including undertaking 1-1 engagement with service users in an honest, open and non-judgmental way.
• Recognising and valuing service users as individuals, acknowledging the importance of always maintaining the service user’s respect and dignity and ensure that the care provided respects equality and diversity.
• Escalating any concerns to a Registered Nurse.
• Monitoring and recording service user clinical observations as directed by a Senior Clinician/Registered Nurse/ B4, such as physical observations and vital signs and escalating as appropriate any signs or symptoms of deterioration or that do not fulfil the personal parameters to the relevant professional.
• Accessing staff support to manage the emotional demands of the work and to sustain curiosity and empathy for patients and colleagues.
• Encouraging and supporting service users to engage with healthy lifestyles, participate in community meetings and other activities of their interest.
• Escorting service users, as required, in line with Trust policies, under guidance and supervision of Senior Healthcare Support Workers, Nursing
• Advocating for service users’ needs and rights within Trust policy

The Forensic Directorate supports a yearly rotation of staff to other wards to enable them to acquire new skills, avoid burnouts and gain the full benefit and experience working in the forensic directorate. The post holder may hence be rotated to other ward as part of further development and to meet service needs.

This advert closes on Tuesday 23 Jun 2026

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