Assistant Psychologist

Assistant Psychologist, Band 4
Permanent - Full Time - 37.5 hours per week

We are pleased to advertise for two assistant psychologists. There are exciting opportunities to work in Intensive Community Support Team (ICST) which is attached to the Community Learning Disability Teams in the boroughs of Bexley, Greenwich and Bromley. ICST is a small friendly team working intensively with clients who are risk of hospital admission or placement breakdown. The base for one post is in Greenwich the other in Bexley.

You would also be part of a thriving learning disability psychology speciality with seventeen clinical staff working in three community learning disability teams across three boroughs. The psychology speciality is a creative and innovative one, encouraging research and service evaluation.

You would have a varied workload supporting the work of the clinical psychologists and behaviour specialists within the team. You would have weekly supervision with as Clinical Psychologist as well as formal and informal opportunities to develop your career.

In addition to an Honours Degree in Psychology (2(i) or above), previous experience with people with learning disabilities and/or people who exhibit behaviour that challenges, the ability to work as part of a team and good communication skills are essential requirements for this post. Applicants with previous experience of working as an assistant psychologist are particularly encouraged to apply.

The post-holder will contribute towards the assessment of clients with challenging behaviour and mental health difficulties, assist with drawing up interventions plans, training, individual work and monitoring of behaviours and symptoms.

The post-holder will also assist in a range of other tasks including: clinically related administration; data collection; audits and service evaluation projects; scoring of psychometric tests and questionnaires; and the development of accessible self-help/educational resources for clients

The community teams are friendly and welcoming places to work, you will have opportunities to work with committed and caring colleagues. There is plenty of scope for career development and you will in encouraged to join the Oxleas Assistant Psychologist's Programme and the Adult Learning Disabilities Assistants Reading Group.

The psychology speciality and Oxleas value highly the involvement and expertise of service users - from their being part of interviews for all posts, through to projects to enable their voices to be heard and to influence services.

As a community-based post, the ability to travel independently between locations throughout Oxleas NHS Foundation Trust without unnecessary delays is essential.
Oxleas offers a wide range of NHS healthcare services to people living in South East London and Kent and to people in prison. Our services include community health care such as district nursing and speech and language therapy, care for people with learning disabilities and mental health care such as psychiatry, nursing and therapies. Our multidisciplinary teams look after people of all ages and we work in close partnership with other parts of the NHS, local councils and the voluntary sector and through our new provider collaboratives. Our 4,000 members of staff work in many different settings including hospitals, clinics, prisons, children’s centres, schools and people’s homes. We have over 125 sites in a variety of locations across the London Boroughs of Bexley, Bromley Greenwich and into Kent and manage hospital sites including Queen Mary’s Hospital, Sidcup and Memorial Hospital in Woolwich as well as the Bracton Centre, our medium secure unit for people with mental health needs. We are one of the largest providers of prison health services providing healthcare to prisoners across Kent and South London. We are proud of the care we provide and our people

Our purpose is to improve lives by providing the best possible care to our patients and their families. This is strengthened by our new values:
We’re Kind

We’re Fair

We Listen

We Care

**Clinical**:
2. To develop formulations and deliver therapeutic interventions involving the psychological treatment and/or management of a client’s problems as part of a care plan, under the supervision of a qualified professional psychologist.
3. To assist in the coordination and running of therapeutic and/or psycho
- educational groups or clinical projects.
4. To work with other staff to assess or support service users in community or inpatient settings and contribute to multi-disciplinary discussions or care guidelines as agreed with the clinical psychologist providing supervision.
5. To assist in the development of a psychologically based framework of understanding and care to the benefit of all clients of the service, across all settings where care takes place.

Teaching, training, and supervision
1. In common with all clinical psychologists, to receive regular clinical supervision in ac