Operational Mortuary & Bereavement Services Deputy, Ipswich

Go back East Suffolk and North Essex NHS Foundation Trust

Operational Mortuary & Bereavement Services Deputy

The closing date is 18 May 2026

Following a recent service restructure, an exciting opportunity has arisen for an experienced and motivated Anatomical Pathology Technologists to join Ipswich Hospital as the deputy for Mortuary and Bereavement Services. You will work closely with the Strategic Operational Lead for Mortuary and Bereavement Services and your counterpart at Colchester Hospital to support the delivery of a high-quality, compassionate and compliant mortuary service at ESNEFT.

In this role, you will have a strong focus on leadership, service development, governance and regulatory compliance. You will work with the Deputy at Colchester to provide cross-site managerial support where required, ensuring consistent working practices, high professional standards and continuous service improvement.

You will be a qualified Anatomical Pathology Technologist with a Royal Society for Public Health Diploma in Anatomical Pathology Technology (or equivalent), and significant experience of working within a complex mortuary environment.

Main duties of the job

• Provide effective and compassionate leadership and management at the Ipswich Hospital site.
• Ensure compliance with quality standards, performance monitoring and reporting requirements, and act as the named Mortuary Person Designate under the Human Tissue Authority licence, ensuring the sensitive handling and disposal of human tissue in accordance with legislation, national guidance and Trust policy.
• Day-to-day management of Anatomical Pathology Technologists, Medical Examiner Officer's and trainee staff, including personal development planning, encouraging and supporting CPD and training performance management.
• Managing staff sickness absence, annual leave, on-call rotas and appraisals.
• Ensure staff compliance with mandatory training and health and safety requirements.
• With the Strategic Operational Lead and Colchester Deputy, develop, authorise and review Standard Operating Procedures and Policies, ensuring all staff read, understand and implement.
• Contributing to trust policies relating to management of deceased patients, death certification, and sensitive disposal of human tissue, seeking consent for post mortem examination and viewing of deceased patients.

Experience

• Managing or supervising staff
• Developing and delivering presentations or training to other staff
• Experience of participating in audits
• Significant and proven post qualification experience of working in a Mortuary
• Experience of working with bereaved families
• Recruitment and Selection
• Appraisal and other relevant
• Experience of undertaking risk assessments, incident investigation and complaint investigation

Qualifications

• Degree in Anatomical Pathology Technology or equivalent qualification or relevant experience
• Relevant specialist qualification or training to postgraduate diploma level or equivalent level of experience

Knowledge

• Have a comprehensive and working knowledge of the Human Tissue Act 2004
• Ability to work to Human Tissue Authority codes of practice and have a good working knowledge of Authority Standards

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.

Employer name

East Suffolk and North Essex NHS Foundation Trust