Biomedical Equipment Support Specialist

About the role

The Biomedical Equipment Support Specialist (BESS) provides clinical and administrative support to staff, patients, and administrators for all matters of concern relating to the facility wide lifecycle management of medical equipment. Biomedical support requires the application of engineering and mechanical concepts and methodology to provide lifecycle management and technical support of diagnostic, therapeutic devices, monitoring, and other equipment utilized in the practice of medicine.

Responsibilities

• Lifecycle management of all medical systems such as imaging, life support, dialysis, and monitoring to include physical and network support.
• Captures and coordinates with other facility support departments including but not limited to Facilities Management Service (FMS), Office of Information Technology (OIT), Patient Safety, Sterile Processing Service (SPS), Logistics, Contracting, Informatics, and Environmental Management Service (EMS).
• Works effectively with other facility support departments to coordinate and work on specific tasks including but not limited to incoming inspections, regular and unscheduled maintenance, and planning for end of life replacement in conjunction with clinical services.
• Utilizes common test equipment including, but not limited to patient simulators, pulse generators, network analyzers, test phantoms, electrical safety analyzers, oscilloscopes, and multimeters.
• Maintains functional knowledge of relevant safety codes and standards of regulatory bodies including, but not limited to, The Joint Commission (TJC), National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation (AAMI).
• Documents all work performed in the computerized maintenance management system (CMMS).
• Applies basic networking principles to resolve medical system communication issues including, but not limited to, node to server failures.
• Provides training and education as appropriate to medical technology end users and clinical staff.
• Provides mentoring and technical training to peers and BESS at developmental levels.
• May be tasked with leading and managing installation or upgrade projects for medical devices and systems.

Requirements

Applicants pending the completion of educational or certification/licensure requirements may be referred and tentatively selected but may not be hired until all requirements are met. 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: Candidates will not be appointed under authority of 38 U.S.C. chapters 73 or 74, to serve in a direct patient-care capacity in VHA who is not proficient in written and spoken English. See Chapter 2, section D, paragraph 5a, this part.