Senior Dementia Intensive Support Team Practitioner

Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust provides child and adult mental health services, learning disability, wellbeing, older people's and eating disorder services across Norfolk and Suffolk.

At any one time, around 23,000 people in Norfolk and Suffolk are receiving care and attention from the Trust. We believe in whole life care - seeing people in the context of their whole lives, understanding the importance of good physical health, friends, family, spirituality, culture, home, work, education and a sense of purpose and achievement to experience good mental health.

Nearly 3,200 full and part-time practitioners care for our service users in hospitals, in the community and in their own homes, whilst an additional 900+ staff provide non-clinical support, including cleaning, delivering supplies, ward administration, information technology, human resources and financial services.

We are committed to delivering quality driven mental health services. Every individual makes a valuable contribution. We are proud of our staff who have been commended for the care they provide. Do you value working positively, respectfully and together? If so, we’d love you to join us

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JOB DESCRIPTION/PERSON SPECIFICATION

YOUR APPLICATION

**Job overview**:
**Dementia Intensive Support Team - Senior DIST Practitioner Band 6 (Mental Health Nurse/OT/Social Worker)**

This is an exciting opportunity to join a passionate and motivated, multi-disciplinary team of professionals who support people with dementia and their carers to remain living independently in the community.

The team has a philosophy of early intervention and specialises in working with those who are hard to engage with. We become involved when situations are breaking down including periods of crisis. The team aims to prevent unnecessary admissions to hospital and premature moves to long term care. It has an open referral system where anyone can refer in, and works with people for short periods, aiming to stabilise situations and ensure there is support in place to meet their needs in the future.

**Main duties of the job**:
Working with other multi-disciplinary professionals within the team you will:

- Manage and hold a caseload
- Undertake initial assessments including risk assessments
- Engage and work with clients with dementia and their carers
- Liaise with statutory and voluntary Sector to get care and support in place as required
- Triage referrals and undertake duty role
- Attend Clinical and Business Meetings for the team
- Take on a supervisory role within the team
- Represent team in meetings with partner agencies

**Working for our organisation**:
Here at NSFT we pride ourselves on being a welcoming, talented, friendly and supportive team who like nothing better than sharing experiences and learning from each other. In addition to ongoing training and development opportunities, we are committed to providing an environment in which you can thrive.

**Why work for us?** We have challenges as a Trust, but we have ambitious aspirations, are pushing ahead with exciting transformation work and we need dedicated individuals to support us on our journey. We have strong, established professional networks coupled with an exceptional leadership team who will ensure you are truly cared for and cared about.

**Why Norfolk and Suffolk? **The people here are warm and welcoming, you’ll never be far from the beautiful coastline or Broads National Park. We’re an hour and a half away from London and have an international airport in Norwich too. Our villages, towns and cities are packed full of history, independent cafes, shops and theatres. We have excellent shopping, eating out, top ranking schooling and affordable house prices too.

The Dementia Intensive Support Team is a part of the Suffolk Care Group, working within the community to meet the needs of people with Dementia and their carers. We are a passionate and supportive team with a desire to develop and learn from each other.

**Detailed job description and main responsibilities**:

- Manage and hold a caseload acting in Care Coordinator role during our involvement which is expected to be short term
- Undertake initial assessments and risk assessments and complete associated paperwork with this on our electronic system (Lorenzo)
- Engage and work intensively with clients with dementia and their carers often in complex situations or when in crisis
- Demonstrate strong communication skills and an ability to empathise and engage with both the individual with dementia and their carers often in difficult circumstances
- Liaise with statutory and voluntary Sector to get care and support in place as required
- Monitor and support packages of care that are implemented to ensure they meet the needs
- Undertake the triage role for the open referral system and act as a duty worker for the team. This involves taking immediate calls and responding to the needs/identifying if there is a role for the team
- Attend Cl