Orthopedic Technician

The Orthopedic Health Technician (OHT) is assigned to the Orthopedic Outpatient Clinics which is organizationally responsible to the Orthopedic Division of the Department of Surgery. This position is that of a journeyman technician who provides direct patient care to a select population of patients requiring casts, braces, splints, and traction in the Sacramento VAMC treating locations (Outpatient, ED, Operating room, and inpatient areas) outlined above.

Major duties
The Orthopedic Health Technician also provides staffing support for the Podiatry clinic as workload permits. In addition, the incumbent is responsible for the operation and maintenance of all equipment used in the application and removal of casts Major duties include, but are not limited to the following: Demonstration knowledge of OSHA safety standards for blood borne pathogens and universal precaution techniques to protect patient and self from infections. Knowledge of sterilization procedures used to clean instruments to prevent the spread of infectious and contagious diseases. Maintains/cleans reusable medical equipment (RME) according to manufacturer's instructions. Thorough knowledge of methods, techniques and the sequence undertaken in the development of casts and braces, a thorough knowledge of materials and their applications and a high level of skill in the use of tools and equipment. Knowledge of normal and abnormal results to recognize and report obvious abnormalities during procedures. Knowledge of proper body mechanics to ensure safety of self and patients. Basic knowledge of Vista, Windows NT and the use of compatible personal computer systems and specific knowledge of the architecture and full use of the CPRS EMR. Work Schedule: Full-time; Monday-Friday, 8:00 AM to 4:30 PM Telework: Not Available Virtual: This is not a virtual position. Position Description/PD#: Orthopedic Technician/PD11739O Relocation/Recruitment Incentives: Not Authorized Critical Skills Incentive (CSI): Not Authorized Permanent Change of Station (PCS): Not Authorized

Qualifications
To qualify for this position, applicants must meet all requirements by the closing date of this announcement, 11/12/2026. TIME-IN-GRADE REQUIREMENT: Applicants who are current Federal employees and have held a GS grade any time in the past 52 weeks must also meet time-in-grade requirements by the closing date of this announcement. For a GS-7 position you must have served 52 weeks at the GS-6. The grade may have been in any occupation, but must have been held in the Federal service. An SF-50 that shows your time-in-grade eligibility must be submitted with your application materials. If the most recent SF-50 has an effective date within the past year, it may not clearly demonstrate you possess one-year time-in-grade, as required by the announcement. In this instance, you must provide an additional SF-50 that clearly demonstrates one-year time-in-grade. Note: Time-In-Grade requirements also apply to former Federal employees applying for reinstatement as well as current employees applying for Veterans Employment Opportunities Act of 1998 (VEOA) appointment. INDIVIDUAL OCCUPATIONAL REQUIREMENT: Positions in this series range widely in type and include support duties to medical or health personnel such as audiologists, speech pathologists, medical officers, and optometrists. Therefore, technician experience is experience that required application of the knowledge, methods, and techniques of the position to be filled – Orthopedic Technician. MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS: You may qualify based on your experience as described below: Orthopedic Technician, GS-7 Specialized Experience: You must have one year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the next lower grade GS-6 in the normal line of progression for the occupation in the organization. Examples of specialized experience would typically include, but are not limited to: includes assists physician in application of special casts, i.e., body casts, spicas, etc;Sets up and maintains a sterile field for minor orthopedic procedures such as intra-articular injections, aspirations, and subcutaneous hardware removal.; Reviews and compares clinic schedule with availability of bone films to ensure patient and films are available for clinic appointment; makes daily rounds on inpatient units. Checks orthopedic equipment, performs safety checks, and provides direct feedback to nurses and area leadership, when needed. You will be rated on the following Competencies for this position: Attention to Detail Customer Service Decision Making Flexibility Integrity/Honesty Interpersonal Effectiveness Interpersonal Skills Medical Information Reading Reading Comprehension Self-Management Stress Tolerance Teamwork Writing Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations (e.g., professional; philanthropic; religions; spiritual; community; student; social). Volunteer work helps build critical competencies, knowledge, and skills and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience. Note: A full year of work is considered to be 35-40 hours of work per week. Part-time experience will be credited on the basis of time actually spent in appropriate activities. Applicants wishing to receive credit for such experience must indicate clearly the nature of their duties and responsibilities in each position and the number of hours a week spent in such employment. Physical Requirements: For more information on this qualification standard, please visit https://www.va.gov/ohrm/QualificationStandards/ Hold patient's extremity steadily for up to one hour. Works at computer terminal. Involves prolonged standing and holding of surgical instrumentation when working in the operating room/treatment room. For more information on these qualification standards, please visit the United States Office of Personnel Management's website at https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/general-schedule-qualification-standards/.

How to apply
All applicants are encouraged to apply online. To apply for this position, you must complete the questionnaire and submit the documentation specified in the Required Documents section below. The complete application package must be submitted by 11:59 PM (ET) on 11/12/2026 to receive consideration. To preview the questionnaire click https://apply.usastaffing.gov/ViewQuestionnaire/13107280. To begin, click Apply Online to create a USA JOBS account or log in to your existing account. Follow the prompts to select your USA JOBS resume and/or other supporting documents and complete the occupational questionnaire. Click Submit My Answers to submit your application package. NOTE: It is your responsibility to ensure your responses and appropriate documentation is submitted prior to the closing date. Beginning September 27, 2025, Federal agencies will only accept resumes up to two pages in length to comply with the Merit Hiring Plan. Resumes longer than two pages will result in ineligibility for further consideration for the position. USAJOBS will not allow you to upload or build resumes longer than two pages, and you will need to update the resumes in your profile before applying for a job. Resumes should include information relevant to the knowledge, skills, abilities, and competencies of the position to which you are applying. VA is unable to make assumptions about qualifications if not clearly listed. Resumes must be legible so they can be reviewed for eligibility, minimum qualifications and other position requirements listed in the job announcement. Your resume must be 5MB or less. We recommend saving and uploading your resume as a PDF to maintain formatting and number of pages. We also accept GIF, JPG, JPEG, PNG, RTF, TXT, PDF, ODT or Word (DOC or DOCX). We do not accept PDF portfolio files. We recommend using a sans-serif font size like Lato, if available. Other widely available options are Calibri, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, Open San Source Sans Pro, Roboto or Noro Sans. Make your page margins 0.5 inches. Consider using 14-point size font for titles and 10-point for the main text in your resume. The resume builder can help you create a resume using these recommendations and uses the information in your USAJOBS profile to help you get started. Helpful Hints for Creating a Two-Page Resume: Prioritize most relevant and recent experience Use concise, results focused language Align language from the job announcement Focus on demonstrating skills and competencies Remove outdated or unrelated experience Use the USAJOBS resume builder Additional guidance on this new requirement and resume building tools can be found at: https://help.usajobs.gov/faq/application/documents/resume/page-limit https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/hiring-information/merit-hiring-plan-resources/applicant-guidance-on-the-two-page-resume-limit/ Special Employment Consideration: VA encourages persons with disabilities to apply, including those eligible for hiring under 5 CFR 213.3102(u), Schedule A, Appointment of persons with disabilities [i.e., intellectual disabilities, severe physical disabilities, or psychiatric disabilities], and/or Disabled veterans with a compensable service-connected disability of 30% or more. Contact the Agency Contact for information on how to apply under this appointment authority via the Selective Placement Coordinator. The Interagency Career Transition Assistance Plan (ICTAP) and Career Transition Assistance Plan (CTAP) provide eligible displaced Federal/VA competitive service employees with selection priority over other candidates for competitive service vacancies. To be qualified you must submit appropriate documentation (a copy of the agency notice, your most recent performance rating, and your most recent SF-50 noting current position, grade level, and duty location) and be found well-qualified for this vacancy. To be well-qualified: applicants must possess experience that exceeds the minimum qualifications of the position including all selective factors, and who are proficient in most of the required competencies of the job. Information about ICTAP and CTAP eligibility is on OPM's Career Transition Resources website at http://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/workforce-restructuring/employee-guide-to-career-transition/. During the application process you may have an option to opt-in to make your resume available to hiring managers in the agency who have similar positions. Opting in does not impact your application for this announcement, nor does it guarantee further consideration for additional positions.