Senior Paediatric Occupational Therapist

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About Us

EPUT provides community health, mental health and learning disability services to support more than 3.2 million people living across Bedfordshire, Essex and Suffolk. Also:

• We are among the largest employers in the in the East of England region, with more than 10,000 staff working across more than 200 sites.
• We run the COVID-19 vaccination programme across mid and south Essex and Suffolk and north east Essex.

EPUT was formed on 1 April 2017 following the merger of North Essex Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust (NEP) and South Essex Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust (SEPT). A new leadership team was established at the Trust in 2020.
Our vision and values

Our Vision

"To be the leading health and wellbeing service in the provision of mental health and community care".

Our Purpose

"We care for people every day. What we do together, matters".

Our Values

• We Care
• We Learn
• We Empower

Our strategic objectives

• We will deliver safe, high quality integrated care services.
• We will enable each other to be the best that we can.
• We will work together with our partners to make our services better.
• We will help our communities to thrive.

Our services

• Mental Health Services
• Community Health Services
• Learning Disabilities Services
• Social Care

Find out more about the services we offer in our service directory.

Job overview

An exciting opportunity has arisen for two qualified Occupational Therapist to join our paediatric therapy team based at the Lighthouse Child Development Centre in Southend-on-Sea. We offer our employees the opportunity to develop into specialist paediatric therapists whilst working in an experienced and very supportive multi-agency team. The service will be operates using a tiered approach as recommended by RCOT for all children referred.

We are looking for two Band 6 Occupational therapists, full time and part-time hours will be considered.

You will be part of the Band 6 rotations that we have within our Paediatric Therapy Team offering you the chance to learn the skills needed to work with the diverse range of conditions in children that a Paediatric Occupational Therapist may work with. The post is based at the Lighthouse Child Development Centre and will require you to drive to different schools and or home settings. You will be working closely with staff employed by education. You will receive extensive in-house training and ongoing direct senior support to enable you to carry out this job-role

Main duties of the job

We offer:

• A supportive multi-agency team of experienced clinicians and assistants with a varied skill mix.
• Development of expertise in the areas of management of children with a wide range of conditions that affect their day to day function. This includes neuro-disability, co-ordination difficulties, neuro-developmental problems and difficulties with sensory processing.
• The opportunity to develop presentation skills and multi-agency working with colleagues in education
• Opportunities to provide training to parents, education staff, colleagues and other professional
• The opportunity to start working using our newly introduced tiered approach which has been recommended by RCOT for all children referred to our service.
• Opportunities to develop your personal and clinical skills through a range of learning experiences specifically linked with your appraisal objectives and identified development needs including joint consultations and shadowing.
• Regular professional support, including an appraisals, supervision and continued professional development (CPD)
• Departmental in-service development programme as well as bi-monthly clinical effectiveness days
• Regular OT team meetings

Working for our organisation

EPUT are looking for motivated staff who shares our Trust values of Care, Learn and Empower. In return, EPUT can offer you a range of benefits and development including;

• Season Ticket Loans
• NHS discounts for staff
• Excellent Training facilities and opportunities
• Buying and Selling annual leave scheme
• The opportunity to work bank shifts and expand knowledge and experience in other areas
• Salary Sacrifice schemes including lease cars and Cycle to Work
• Day One Flexible Employer

Join our Staff bank

What is Staff Bank?

Our EPUT NHS staff bank is an entity managed by the trust that hires clinical and non-clinical healthcare professionals to take on shifts at our trust hospitals and community settings. Here at EPUT we maintain our own bank of specialist staff to ensure that we are able offer safe and effective care at all times.

All our permanent staff are automatically enrolled onto the staff bank however this does not mean you have to work any additional shifts, but the option is there for you if you wish.

If you are joining our Trust in a fixed term role, please indicate on your New Starter Paperwork that you wish to join our staff bank.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

• The post-holder will perform advanced occupational therapy assessments of patients with diverse presentations and complex physical and developmental conditions, to develop and deliver an individualised treatment plan, maintaining accurate patient records. As an autonomous practitioner, they will have responsibility for their own caseload and be responsible for a defined area of the service or a particular patient type, working without direct supervision.
• The post-holder will be responsible for supervising, educating and assessing the performance of Band 5 Occupational Therapists and 4 Therapy Assistants and students. They will be expected to contribute to evidence-based audit and research projects to further own and teams clinical practice, making recommendations to clinical lead/manager of service for changes to practice by the team.
• The post-holder will provide a specialist Occupational Therapy assessment, treatment and advice service for children with a variety of learning and physical disabilities and associated communication difficulties, who are referred to the service. This may include working within the Child Development Centres, mainstream and special schools and nurseries, and visits to other services such as the wheelchair clinic.
• The post-holder will provide therapy service as part of the multidisciplinary team, working with other health, education and social care professionals and to effectively manage own caseload. To provide specialist OT input in an area of specialism and contribute to the development of the OT service in an area of specialism.
• To assist the service in the Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) tribunal cases as required, providing specialist and evidence based recommendations to meet the child's needs working in close collaboration with colleagues in physiotherapy and education.
• To provide workshops/ training packages to parents, children and young people's workforce to build their confidence to assist the service user in self-management strategies.
• To supervise, train and performance manage junior and student occupational therapists in children's services.
• To participate and contribute to the development, maintenance and evaluation of the Children's Occupational Therapy Service.

Person specification

Education, qualification

Essential criteria

• Diploma/Degree in Occupational Therapy
• Member of British Association of Occupational Therapists
• Registered with Health and Care Professions Council
• Full UK Driving License

Desirable criteria

• Involvement in Special Interest Groups

Previous experience

Essential criteria

• experience or understanding of the role of the Occupational Therapist in the Specialist area and the treatment interventions available
• 12 months plus experience as a Band 5 OT
• Experience of supervising Junior Staff, Students and/or Support Staff
• Experience of working as part of a rehabilitation and/or multi-disciplinary team

Desirable criteria

• Student clinical supervision
• Clinical Educators course
• Knowledge of current national policies such as NICE relevant to role

Essential criteria

Essential criteria

• Good verbal and written communication skills
• Ability to organise, prioritise and delegate

!Important Professional References

Make sure that as a part of your application you have professional references with business contract information covering your last three year employment history. We are unable to accept personal or character references.

As a newly appointed employee you are responsible for incurring the cost of your initial DBS check relevant to your post, the amount will be deducted from your first salary with the Trust.

Applications for Job Share are positively welcomed.

Equal Opportunities Employer

Our Trust is an Equal Opportunities Employer. We particularly welcome applications from people with experience of using mental health services. We also hold the Disability two tick symbol and have made the pledge to commit to employing more people with learning disabilities, we encourage people with a disability to apply. If you require this application form in another format i.e. Braille or audio tape etc, please contact the Recruitment Department on 01375 364513 or email epunft.recruitment.adverts@nhs.net and we can arrange for this to be dispatched to you.

The Trust has the right to expire vacancies prior to the closing date if they so wish. The Trust makes every attempt to contact all applicants and we strongly advise that you check the email account which is registered with NHS Jobs regularly, we would advise however due to the high number of applications we receive that if you have not heard from us within three weeks of the closing date your application has been unsuccessful on this occasion.

We are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults, and expect all staff to undertake this commitment. Applicants will be subject to robust safer recruitment processes.

Covid Vaccination

Although Covid vaccinations are no longer a mandatory requirement within the NHS we continue to encourage and support the vaccination uptake as this remains the best line of defence against Covid19. The safety of our staff and patients is a top priority for us at EPUT.

If you would like to book a Covid vaccination or would like more information please contact us by emailing epunft.cv19hr@nhs.net.

Employer certification / accreditation badges

Applicant requirements

You must have appropriate UK professional registration.

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.

Documents to download

• Senior Paediatric Occupational Therapist (PDF, 689.9KB)
• Senior Paediatric Occupational Therapist (PDF, 437.9KB)
• Why Join The NHS Pension Scheme (PDF, 91.3KB)
• EPUT Pledge - Step into Health (PDF, 211.0KB)
• Candidate Privacy Policy (PDF, 336.6KB)
• Right to Work Information (PDF, 293.6KB)
• Employer Recognition Scheme - Gold Award (PDF, 27.7KB)
• Trust Vision and Values (PDF, 168.9KB)
• Values of the NHS Pension (PDF, 151.3KB)
• EPUT Staff Benefits (PDF, 89.3KB)