Assistant Psychologist

Brighton & Hove CAMHS have commissioned an innovative local service for children and young people who have a diagnosis of Autistic Spectrum Condition (ASC), their families and networks of support. We are looking for a Band 4 Assistant Psychologist to join the established team.

Since April 2021, the newly commissioned Family Intensive Support Service for ASC (known as FISS-ASC) has been delivering specialist assessment and interventions, where children and young people with autism presenting with behaviour that challenges; which adversely impacts on their functioning, and risks their access to educational and social opportunities.

The FISS-ASC service aims to support keeping children and young people with their families and living within their local communities, therefore improving outcomes for all family members. The service provides early intervention and intensive support to families reaching crisis, with short term interventions which support a step up and step-down approach throughout their care journey.

**Interventions include**: consultation, specialist assessments & behaviour support plans, workshops, groups and individual therapeutic interventions.

The team provides specialist psychological, functional and behavioural consultation, assessment and direct support to children and young people with autism, their families, and their systems of support, across the local community. Members of the team have particular skills in the assessment and delivery of evidenced based treatment for understanding and supporting challenging behaviour, alongside skills in working with complex

networks and systems.

The team ethos is based on valuing the expertise of the families and professionals who consult to and use the service, and this value should remain central to formulation and intervention. In line with a multi-disciplinary approach, support is offered to children, young people and their families within a holistic framework. As such, clinicians have the opportunity to draw on a range of models including: - systemic, psychological,

occupational, behavioural, sensory, and psychoeducational models.

The FISS-ASC team work closely with colleagues within the CAMHS Learning Disability team, and the Neurodevelopmental Psychology service and alongside other partner child development services.

**We can offer you**:
Regular appraisal, personal development planning and opportunities for continuing professional development.

Regular supervision

Opportunities to work closely with multi-professional teams

Involvement in service development

Involvement in providing training.

We are looking for a keen and hard-working assistant psychologist to join this innovative new service, who has a particular interest and some

knowledge and experience of working with children and young people with Autistic Spectrum Disorders, and their families, and who wants to

expand their skills further in this area.

The post will be varied and will include audit and evaluation of all aspects of service delivery, setting up and administering group interventions and workshops for young people and parents, creating resources such as newsletters as well as clinical resources, setting up and administering clinics, answering enquiries from service users and other professionals, and helping to create and disseminate training packages.

a good time keeper, and able to work using their own initiative, but know when to ask for help.

The post holder will have the opportunity to co-facilitate and participate in group work, interview young people and their parents as part of service evaluation, take part in school visits to help inform assessments etc.; hence it is important that the post holder is able to relate well to young people and their parents/carers while maintaining appropriate boundaries, as well as being able to relate to other members of the team.

We will aim to provide the post holder with a wide range of clinical and learning experiences, including observing a variety of client and professional consultations, attending in-house training, attending multi-agency meetings, school visits etc. The post holder will also have a chance to visit other NHS and local authority children's services, particularly those associated with services for children and young people with

neurodevelopmental disorders.

The post holder will also be a member of the wider Brighton & Hove Psychology team, which is a lively and active team of psychologists working within Specialist CAMHS, Learning Disability, Community Child Health and Neuro-developmental disorders, Social Services and Education. The post holder will be expected to attend the regular Psychology business meetings and participate in Trust wide CPD and training events.