Band 7-8a Development Post Practitioner Psychologist

Job summary

We are looking for an enthusiastic Clinical / Practitioner Psychologist or Psychotherapist to work in the Bucks Community Learning Disability Health Team. We welcome applications from either newly qualified Practitioner Psychologists / Psychotherapists or those with relevant post qualification experience looking for a development post holder will be able to progress from Band 7 to band 8a once they demonstrate that they meet the competencies specified for Band 8a are interested in receiving applications from Clinical / Practitioner Psychologists and people with skills and experiences in the application of psychotherapeutic and/or systemic approaches to working with people with learning disabilities or post can be full or part time and will be based within the Bucks Community Learning Disability Health Team which has bases in Wycombe and Aylesbury.

Main duties of the job

The post holder will provide a psychological / psychotherapeutic service to people living in the community with a learning disability and their systems of support. Service users present with a range of presenting problems, such as challenging behaviours, mental health problems, emotional dysregulation and complex health conditions including dementia and epilepsy.

Our psychology services offer Behavioural and Systemic approaches and psychologists also have expertise in using adapted CBT, CAT, EMDR, AMBIT, Video Interaction Guidance, Attachment Informed approaches and Psychodynamic models of working.

The post holder will be professionally supervised by an appropriately experienced senior psychological practitioner and will have the opportunity to be part of an innovative and active group of Psychological professionals. The service has strong links with the psychology department at the Universities of Oxford and Hertfordshire in relation to both clinical training and research. HPFT has a strong commitment to supporting on-going continuing professional development.

Applicants will need to be registered as a practitioner psychologist with Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) or with another relevant professional body, such as the UK Council for Psychotherapy (UKCP) or British Psychoanalytic Council (BPC).

Car driver essential, or access to a car (unless you have a disability as defined by the Equality Act 2010 which prevents you from driving).

About us

Hertfordshire Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust (HPFT) is an outstanding organisation with ambitions to match. We are one of just five mental health trusts to achieve an overall rating of 'Outstanding' from theCare Quality Commission, and our aim is to be the leading provider of mental health and specialist learning disability services in the country.

Our family of over 4000 members of staff provide health and social care for over 400,000 people with mental ill health, physical ill health and learning disabilities across Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, and Norfolk, delivering these services within the community and several inpatient settings. We also deliver a range of nationally commissioned specialist services including Tier 4 services for children and young people, perinatal services, plus medium and low secure learning disabilities services.

The care we provide makes a fantastic difference to the lives of our service users, their families and carers - everything is underpinned by choice, independence and equality, with our Trust values embedded throughout:

Our Trust values are:

Welcoming. Kind. Positive. Respectful. Professional.

These values are at the core of who we are and everything we do.

Job description

Job responsibilities

Job Summary :

To provide a qualified clinical psychology or psychotherapy service to adults with learning disabilities and service providers and carers within the Community. To provide specialist assessment and interventions, as well as offering advice and consultation on psychological care to non-psychological services colleagues and other non-professional carers. To work autonomously within professional guidelines and the overall framework of the teams policies and procedures. To use research skills for audit, service development and research. Contribute to identifying key areas and priorities for psychological services.

All staff should comply with the Trusts Anti-Discriminatory Statement, Employee Charter, Trust Policies and Procedures, Code of Conduct and Equality and Diversity.

Key Relationships:

Working with Adults with learning disabilities referred to the Community LD Health Team in Bucks. Younger people may be worked with only if appropriate, for example, in preparation for transition into adult services.

Working alongside colleagues within health, social care teams and education.

Working under the Learning Disability and Forensic Strategic Business Unit within HPFT

Duties and Responsibilities :

Clinical Responsibility

To hold a clinical workload as a member of Psychological Services and the Community LD Health Team. To provide specialist assessments of service users referred to the Community LD Health Team, based upon the appropriate use, interpretation and integration of psychological information from a variety of sources. To be responsible for formulation and implementation of therapy or treatments based on an appropriate conceptual framework of the problems and employing methods of evidence based efficacy across the full range of care settings. To be responsible for implementing a range of therapy or psychological interventions for individuals, carers, families and groups based on formulations and drawing on different explanatory psychological models and maintaining a number of provisional hypotheses. To evaluate and make decisions about therapy or treatment taking into account theoretical and therapeutic models and highly complex factors concerning historical, developmental processes, which have shaped the individual family or group. To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for assessment, therapy/treatment and discharge of service users. To provide specialist psychological advice, guidance and consultation to colleagues in the team, carers from the public/private and voluntary sector and families. To ensure members of team have access to a psychologically based framework for understanding care of service users through provision of advice and consultation and dissemination of psychological research and theory. To advise, support and facilitate effective and appropriate provision of psychological care by all members of the team. To undertake risk assessment and management of individual service users to provide advice for other professionals on psychological aspects of risk assessment and management. To communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner information concerning assessment, formulation, therapy and treatment plans and to monitor and evaluate progress. To act as care co-ordinator, when required, ensuring the provision of a care package appropriate for the service user needs, co-ordinating the work of others involved with care, taking responsibility for arranging CPA reviews as required and communicating effectively with the service user, his/her family and all others involved in the network of care and to monitor progress during the course of multi-disciplinary interventions. To be responsible for development of a specialist area of psychological interest and service in agreement with professional lead for Psychological Services and according to service priorities, to advise of and participate in service development in this area and be a resource for consultation to colleagues regarding this specialist area. To be a core member of the Community LD Health Team.

Teaching, Training & Supervision

To receive regular clinical and professional supervision from a senior member of psychological services and line manager. To continue to gain a wider post-qualification experience in psychological services or psychotherapy. To develop skills in the area of professional post-graduate teaching, training and supervision and to provide supervision to other MDT staffs psychological or psychotherapeutic work, as appropriate. To provide professional and clinical supervision of assistant psychologists and, as appropriate, to contribute to the supervision of individual cases for trainee clinical psychologists and other psychological students. To contribute to the pre and post qualification teaching of clinical and/or counselling psychology or psychotherapy, as appropriate. To provide advice, consultation and training to staff working with the client group across a range of agencies and settings, where appropriate.

Research & Service Evaluation

To utilise evidencebased literature research to support practice and work. Undertake appropriate research and provide research advice to other staff. To undertake project management including complex audit and service evaluation with colleagues within and across the service to help develop and improve services.

Leadership and Staff Management Responsibility

To be involved, as agreed with the professional lead, in the recruitment of psychological services staff when needed.

Service Development and Improvement

To contribute to the development, evaluation and monitoring of the teams operational policies and services, through the deployment of professional skills in research, service evaluation and audit. To participate, in the development of a high quality responsive and accessible service. To advise both service and professional management on those aspects of the service where psychological and/organisational matters need addressing. Contribute to systematic governance of psychological practice within the service/team.

Other

To contribute to the development and maintenance of the highest professional standards of practice, through active participation in internal and external CPD training and development programmes, in consultation with the post holders professional and service manager(s). To contribute to the development and articulation of best practice in psychological services across the service by continuing to develop the skills as a psychological practitioner or psychotherapist, taking part in regular professional supervision and appraisal and maintaining an active engagement with current developments in the field of psychotherapy and related disciplines. To maintain the highest standards of clinical record keeping including electronic data entry and recording, report writing and the responsible exercise of professional self-governance in accordance with professional codes of practice and Trust policies and procedures. To maintain up to date knowledge of legislation, national and local policies and issues in relation to both the specific client group and mental health.

Additional Information:

Frequent travel required by car throughout the area covered by Community LD Health Team, as required. Flexibility to work in a variety of settings including service users homes, residential, day and in-patient services. An awareness and ability to assess and manage risk in these situations. Additionally the post holder has to work within the Trusts manual handling policy, maintain intense concentration in all aspects of service user management, manage emotional consequences of working with distressing conditions and work in environments where there is occasional exposure to unpleasant conditions. Person Specification

TRAINING AND QUALIFICATIONS

Essential

Doctoral level qualification in clinical, counselling psychology or equivalent. or Post graduate qualification in Psychotherapy, psychodynamic therapy or systemic therapy Registered as a Practitioner psychologist with Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC). or Registered with relevant professional body for example UK Council for Psychotherapy (UKCP) or British Psychoanalytic Council (BPC)

Desirable

Additional post graduate training or qualification in Psychotherapy or systemic therapy.

EXPERIENCE

Essential

Experience of specialist assessment and therapy with service users across a range of care settings Experience of working with a wide variety of service user groups, presenting problems that reflect a range of clinical severity, including maintaining a high degree of professionalism in the face of highly emotive and distressing problems, verbal abuse and the threat of physical abuse. Experience of working in a multidisciplinary team.

Desirable

Direct experience of using therapy with people with disabilities. Experience of teaching, training and/or supervision. Experience of the application of psychological services in different cultural contexts.

KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS

Essential

Skills in the use of complex assessment, therapy or intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration Well developed skills in communicating effectively, orally and in writing, complex, highly technical and/or clinically sensitive information to service users, their families, carers and other professional colleagues, both within and outside the NHS. Skills in providing consultation to other professional and non-professional groups. Knowledge of research methodology, research design and complex, multivariate data analysis as practiced within the clinical fields of psychological services.

Desirable

Knowledge of the theory and practice of specialised psychological therapies in the specific difficult to treat groups ( personality disorder, dual diagnoses, people with additional disabilities etc.) High level knowledge of the theory and practice of at least two specialised psychological therapies. Knowledge of legislation in relation to the client group and mental health.

OTHER

Essential

Ability to teach and train others, using a variety of complex multi-media materials suitable for presentations within public, professional and academic settings. Ability to identify and employ mechanisms of clinical governance as appropriate, to support and maintain clinical practice in the face of regular exposure to highly emotive material and challenging behaviour

Desirable

Experience of working within a multi-cultural framework.

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