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Form of work
SalaryThe Blood Safety, Hepatitis, STI and HIV (BSHSH) Division is the national centre for surveillance of hepatitis, HIV and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in England.
As a Scientist the postholder will be part of a dynamic team responsible for delivering the development, management and coordination of surveillance systems of communicable diseases, focusing on hepatitis. The postholder will support the data collection and validation, and production of routine surveillance intelligence in these areas.
The main responsibilities of the postholder will be to maintain and develop hepatitis surveillance systems, working closely with a wide variety of professionals both within and outside UKHSA to ensure high quality data. The postholder will oversee the co-ordination of requests for data associated with hepatitis, the production of regular and ad hoc outputs from these systems for inclusion in routine national and international reports and information requests from external stakeholders. The role requires liaising with stakeholders within the organisation and outside to lead on the mandatory reporting, quality assurance and standard processes. The postholder will have strong data management skills, ideally with experience in surveillance data. The postholder must have excellent interpersonal skills and an ability to work effectively both autonomously and within a team.
The BSHSH Division aims to:
- Describe trends in the incidence and prevalence of hepatitis, STIs and HIV, especially in important behavioural population sub-groups;
- Describe trends in the incidence and prevalence of all infections transmissible through blood, tissue and organ donations;
- Provide national reference and specialist microbiology and virology services, for public health, clinical and diagnostic purposes;
- Monitor the outputs and effectiveness of hepatitis, STI and HIV prevention activities and programmes and support development of national policy;
- Provide information for local needs assessment, service commissioning and evaluation, and to guide prevention activities aimed at reducing risk behaviours and interrupting infection transmission, including through blood, organ and tissue donation;
- Investigate national and uncommon outbreaks, respond to international health alerts, and provide advice on the risks posed;
- Train those working in blood safety and in hepatitis, STI and HIV surveillance, monitoring and Prevention,
- Lead and contribute to research in hepatitis, STI and HIV epidemiology, diagnostics, and infection prevention and control.
Essential Criteria:
It is important through your application and Statement of Suitability of 1000 words that you give evidence and examples of proven experience of each of the essential criteria (for full details of all essential criteria please refer to the attached job description, you must review this to produce your statement of suitability):
Essential
- First degree in a relevant subject or equivalent level qualification or significant experience of working at a similar level in specialist area
- Data management, analysis and reporting as well as significant experience of working with multiple sets of data and information systems in health or related
- Knowledge of data security and confidentiality issues
- Work on several separate tasks at the same time, whilst keeping to agreed deadlines; identify and solve day-to-day practical problems
- Analysing, summarising and interpreting complex epidemiological data, and resolving problems
- Ability to work independently and take responsibility for own technical work and time and to work as an effective team member
- Communicate ideas and methods clearly and succinctly to include excellent oral and written communication skills
- An understandingof and commitmenttoequalityofopportunityandgood workingrelationships
Desirable
- Post-graduate degree and / or equivalent or significant experience related to health information
- Experience of working as part of an outbreak investigation
- Experience of scripting and applied use of statistical computing environments such as R, SAS, STATA, SPSS, Mathematical or equivalent
