Supervisory Health Technician (Ophthalmology)

Ophthalmology Technicians in the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) perform functions such as technical clinical care to patients who have received care provided by Ophthalmologists for diagnosis, treatment, prevention, follow-up care and patient counseling. The Technician performs screening procedures such as patient history, pupil responses, visual acuity, and color vision testing. Supervisory Technicians may assume administrative, multidisciplinary and personnel duties.

Qualifications:

Basic Requirements:

• United States Citizenship: Non-citizens may only be appointed when it is not possible to recruit qualified citizens in accordance with VA Policy.
• English Language Proficiency: Health Technicians (Ophthalmology) must be proficient in spoken and written English as required by 38 U.S.C. 7402(d) and 38 U.S.C. 7407(d).
• Experience and Education:
  • Experience: One year of experience in a health care field, such as but not limited to nursing, medical assistant, or health technician. OR
  • Education: Two years above high school with a minimum of six semester hours directly related to a health care field or associate's degree in a health care related degree. OR
  • Experience/Education Combination: Equivalent combinations of experience and education are qualifying. Examples are listed below:
    • Six months of experience in the health care field; and one year above high school; or
    • Six months of experience in the health care field and successful completion of a course for health care technicians, hospital corpsmen, medical service specialists, or ophthalmology technicians given by the U.S. Armed Forces; or
    • Six months of experience in the health care field and completion of an independent study course in Ophthalmic Medical Assisting
• Certification: All applicants must be certified as a Certified Ophthalmic Assistant (COA) with the Joint Commission on Allied Health Personnel in Ophthalmology (JCAHPO). The COA certification is JCAHPO's entry-level certification examination for a Health Technician (Ophthalmology).

May qualify based on being covered by the Grandfathering Provision as described in the VA Qualification Standard for this occupation (only applicable to current VHA employees who are in this occupation and meet the criteria).

Grade Determinations:

Supervisory Health Technician (Ophthalmology), GS-10:

• Experience: One year of experience equivalent to the next lower grade level (GS-9).
  • GS-9 level experience includes:
    • Demonstrated leadership and managerial skills, and skills in interpersonal relations and conflict resolution to deal with employees, team leaders, providers, and managers;
    • Ability to perform the full range of supervisory duties, which includes responsibility for assignment of work to be performed; performance evaluations; selection of qualified staff; and recommendation of awards, advancements, and, when appropriate, disciplinary actions; and
    • Ability to plan, organize, coordinate clinical work flow, set short and/or long term goals for the section, and conduct studies on technical and administrative problems, including personnel shortages, organizational structure, and new technology.
• Demonstrated Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities (KSA): In addition to meeting the all KSAs for the GS-10 grade level, the candidate must demonstrate the potential to acquire the assignment-specific KSA designated by an asterisk (*)
  1. Ability to work independently to set priorities, delegate tasks, meet multiple deadlines, analyze organizational problems, and develop and implement effective solutions to optimize quality, efficiency, performance, and productivity within the service;
  2. Ability to develop policy, manage equipment requests, and provide workload analysis in Ophthalmology Service;
  3. Demonstrated leadership and managerial skills including skill in interpersonal relations and conflict resolution to deal with employees, team members, managers and other departments;
  4. *Ability to perform the full range of supervisory duties which includes responsibility for assignment of work to be performed; competency assessments; performance evaluations; selection of staff; and recommendation of awards, advancements, and when appropriate, disciplinary actions.

Reference: For more information on this qualification standard, please visit https://www.va.gov/ohrm/QualificationStandards/.

The full performance level of this vacancy is GS-10. The actual grade at which an applicant may be selected for this vacancy is GS-10

Physical Requirements: You will be asked to participate in a pre-employment examination or evaluation as part of the pre-employment process for this position. Questions about physical demands or environmental factors may be addressed at the time of evaluation or examination.

Responsibilities:

Major duties include, but are not limited to the following:

• Ability to work independently to set priorities, delegate tasks, meet multiple deadlines, analyze organizational problems, and develop and implement effective solutions to optimize quality, efficiency, performance, and productivity within the service;
• Ability to develop policy, manage equipment requests, and provide workload analysis in Ophthalmology Service;
• Demonstrated leadership and managerial skills including skill in interpersonal relations and conflict resolution to deal with employees, team members, managers and other departments; and
• Ability to perform the full range of supervisory duties which includes responsibility for assignment of work to be performed; competency assessments; performance evaluations; selection of staff; and recommendation of awards, advancements, and when appropriate, disciplinary actions.
• Oversees the integration between ophthalmic medical devices and the electronic medical record system,
• Serves as the point of contact and lead for the Eye Care electronic health record and serving as the liaison between other departments and services.
• Performs supervision, administrative management, and direction of Health Technician auxiliary staff.
• May exercise full administrative and professional responsibility for planning and directing the Health Technician staff activities for the service or equivalent unit at an independent outpatient clinic.
• Exercises supervisory responsibility over a section or equivalent work unit. Typical duties include preparing work assignments, monitoring clinical performances of Health Technician staff, conducting performance appraisals, and other clinical and administrative responsibilities to ensure that the mission of the service and the medical center has been satisfied.
• Assures compliance with accrediting agency and regulatory requirements, establishes and monitors the quality of the pre-analytical processes as part of the overall Health Technician service quality management program, and assures corrective action is initiated as needed.
• Assures orientation and competency assessment of assigned staff, and supervises interactions of Health Technicians with affiliate ophthalmology residents.
• Develops policies and procedures, manages document control, develops performance standards, position descriptions and functional statements, and is responsible for professional and administrative management of an assigned area to include budget execution.
• Maintains interdepartmental relations with other services to accomplish medical center goals. May have overall responsibility for planning, assessing, and evaluating programs to ensure proper coordination between care delivered by the program and overall delivery of healthcare within the facility, or coordination of non-VA care as appropriate.
• Plans and carries out examinations in line with training and accepted practices, and independently makes recommendations about clinical situations, procedures or changes to procedures in some situations. The providers must be able to accept the technician's assessment without rechecking the work. The technician uses methods, recognizes conditions that cause erroneous results or creates dangerous situations, and may independently troubleshoot clinic problems and complex instruments. The technician resolves most differences that arise with patients, coordinates work with others as necessary and interprets policy such as eligibility for prosthetic devices.
• When supervised technicians not available, may perform their imaging duties.

Total Rewards of a Allied Health Professional
Work Schedule: Monday-Friday 7:30am-4:00pm
Recruitment Incentive (Sign-on Bonus): Not Authorized
Permanent Change of Station (Relocation Assistance): Not Authorized
Pay: Competitive salary and regular salary increases.
Paid Time Off: 37-50 days of annual paid time offer per year (13-26 days of annual leave, 13 days of sick leave, 11 paid Federal holidays per year).
Parental Leave: After 12 months of employment, up to 12 weeks of paid parental leave in connection with the birth, adoption, or foster care placement of a child.
Child Care Subsidy: After 60 days of employment, full time employees with a total family income below $144,000 may be eligible for a childcare subsidy up to 25% of total eligible childcare costs for eligible children up to the monthly maximum of $416.66.
Retirement: Traditional federal pension (5 years vesting) and federal 401K with up to 5% in contributions by VA
Insurance: Federal health/vision/dental/term life/long-term care (many federal insurance programs can be carried into retirement)
Telework: Ad-hoc
Virtual: This is not a virtual position.
Functional Statement #: 000000
Permanent Change of Station (PCS): Not Authorized

Salary : $417