Staff Health Medical Doctor (80%)

Place in the organisation  

You are part of the staff health unit, which oversees the delivery of staff health services for MSF staff working in field projects. You will report to the coordinator of the unit and work together with another staff health medical doctor , a specialised nurse as well as psychosocial care specialists.  

On a daily basis, you are in contact with many stakeholders: the company doctor, the medical and HR coordinators in the field, the staff who need your support, as well as colleagues in the human resources department – or the public health department. You also liaise intersectionally with the other MSF sections staff health units and external entities like International SOS.  

Main Responsibilities  

Day in the life of a Staff Health Medical Doctor 

As the staff health medical doctor, every working day will be different: One day you might be talking to a colleague that needs a referral, you provide advice to the health advisors (who work on public health programming for our projects) and you write policy for work health related problems such as ‘Working with a chronical disease in the field. The other day you are working on the implementation of another policy that you developed (e.g., health screening), and a medical coordinator from the field calls for your support in a medical evacuation. In the afternoon you talk to a patient in which project he can work given his medical condition. The next day you are giving a training to medical coordinators and you are debriefing one of them as well, you are also providing advice to the company doctor for a staff member who has a chronical disease. And receive several emails on how to be well prepared health-wise for a specific mission.?  

One day a sudden chronic highly infectious disease is identified in the field. You support the medical coordinator in the implementation of a special system to manage the good health of the staff working in these settings.  

You do not have a lot hands-on contact with patients, but clinical knowledge and experience is essential in case of a medical evacuation, conditional matching and you are a clinical consultant for staff health responsible colleagues in the field. So, we do require an up-to-date medical license registration and there is space to keep up your medical registration as well.  

Clinical leadership  

• Ensure adequate medical pre- and post-assignment support to international staff; 
• Advise the field staff health responsibilities, field staff with medical conditions; 
• Organise occupational health screening; 
• MSF OCA health policy evaluation and  alignment of the staff health services with the overall OCA staff vision; 
• Keep medical data registration, file management updated the organisational structures and processes needed to support delivery of staff health services; 
• Train MSF staff on staff health related issues;  
• Training external health care stakeholders on the reality of MSF field work. 

Policy development  

• You develop policies that ensure occupational and labour legislations are interpreted in a clear, effective and cost-efficient way;  
• You develop and update clinical guidelines and frameworks to ensure appropriate staff health and wellbeing standards;  
• You ensure accurate and up-to-date pre-departure health information, screening and preparation;  
• You clarify the responsibilities of staff health in the field, and between the field and OC and/or contracting sections;   
• You update and communicate efficient the medical evacuation (and repatriation) protocol. 

Practical support to staff and staff health colleagues  

• You are medical focal point for staff members that need to leave their project country for medical reasons (medical evacuation or repatriation). You are well able to keep all stakeholders updated: HR colleagues in HQ, International SOS, Health advisor for the relevant country in HQ, medical coordinator in the project country. You arrange diagnostic assessment, drug prescription, referral documents as needed; 
• You also ensure routine support for the staff health focal points in the projects (approximately 26 countries); 
• You implement and maintain sick leave procedures for (returned) field staff including third party ‘fit to work’ screening; 
• You advise the company doctor on field related conditions to facilitate return to work after illness or in case of chronic health issues; 
• You do monitoring and analysis and you maintain a data collection system in order to flag trends and health risks in missions and offices;  
• You are available for regular 24/7 on call duties. 

Candidate profile  

Required  

• W e are searching for seniority in clinical leadership (min. 5 years of work experience as a registered medical doctor), preferably on a consultancy level.  
• MSF or INGO experience is required.  
• You are comfortable enough with staff health, public health, tropical medicine, infectious disease control and well-being topics to champion them.   
• Flexibility is crucial! If you are the flexible medical professional with experience in occupational health topics, we very much welcome your application.   
• An up-to-date medical license registration.  
• Our working language is English so fluency in English is essential.   
• You have a high degree of work autonomy as well as management capacity and monitoring and evaluation comes natural to you.   
• You focus on providing a good service to your staff health colleagues in the field and towards HQ colleagues you are solution and results oriented partner with strong advising and networking skills.   

Nice to have  

• MSF experience on medical coordinator level is desirable, so are Dutch language skills.  
• It is an asset if you have experience working on occupational health topics in context similar to MSF project countries.