Senior Psychologist, Waltham Forest Psychiatric Liaison Service

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Joining #TeamNELFT means you'll become part of a welcoming and supportive working environment. We're CQC rated Good, and we want you to join us on the journey towards an Outstanding rating. NELFT has sites across North East London, Essex, Kent and Medway. We provide community and mental healthcare services to adults and children within these areas.

The Trust has award winning equality and diversity initiatives and staff health and wellbeing activities. We invest heavily in your development, because when you are valued and supported, we provide the best care to our patients. We are a Level 3 Disability Confident Leader, have been featured in the Working Families Top 10 Employers benchmark for three consecutive years, and we have achieved a Carers UK Level 1 Accreditation. Along with our staff networks and training opportunities, we work hard to embed a just and compassionate culture here at NELFT.

Find out more about NELFT careers and what makes our Trust a great place to work, in this video

Job overview

Senior Psychologist for Waltham Forest Psychiatric Liaison Service

An exciting opportunity has arisen for a Band 8A Senior Counselling or Clinical Psychologist to join Waltham Forest's Psychiatric Liaison Service team. Based at Whipps Cross University Hospital, the successful candidate will use psychological skills to assess, formulate, treat and signpost patients presenting with complex mental health issues in the emergency department and general wards of the hospital. The role involves close liaison with multi disciplinary colleagues throughout the hospital, NELFT's Acute and Rehabilitation Directorate and other services within Waltham Forest and beyond.

Main duties of the job

• Participating in the development and implementation of high standards of clinical care in the psychiatric liaison team environment, working with people who present with high levels of distress, risk and in some cases challenging behaviour. The post holder will ensure the psychology service provided is needs led, compliant with national guidance and is viewed positively by service users.
• Supporting the multidisciplinary Psychiatric Liaison team in their work with frequent users of accident and emergency services.
• Exercising clinical responsibility for undertaking psychological assessment, brief crisis-focussed psychological treatment and onward care planning of people in crisis and their families in consultation with the psychiatric liaison multi-disciplinary team.
• Support the psychiatric liaison team in their work through psychological consultation, training and shared formulations to contribute to the development of staff and improving the quality of service provided to service-users with mental health difficulties accessing accident and emergency.

Working for our organisation

Probationary Period

This post will be subject to a probationary period. Internal applicants are exempt from the probationary period (unless you are an internal applicant currently part way through a probationary period or currently a bank member of staff).

Starting with NELFT

NELFT place a great deal of importance on new starters being properly welcomed and inducted into the Trust. All new starters will join the Trust on the first Monday of each month and will undertake a comprehensive induction of up to two weeks which will include mandatory training, systems training and the allocation of equipment. As part of the process new starters will have the opportunity to also meet the executive team, senior managers and attend a number of drop in sessions focussing in engagement, health and wellbeing and key processes. The induction will be held at our head office in Rainham, Essex.

High Cost Area Supplement - Outer London

This post also attracts payment for High Cost Area Supplement of 15% of the basic salary (with a minimum of £4,313 to a maximum of £5,436 p.a. pro rata for part time).

High Cost Area Supplement - Fringe

This post also attracts payment for High Cost Area Supplement of 5% of the basic salary (with a minimum of £1,192 to a maximum of £2,011 p.a. pro rata for part time).

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

§ To ensure the provision of high quality specialist psychological assessment to service-users presenting to psychiatric liaison services in psychological distress.

§ To ensure that specialist assessments are utilised to support the Acute and Rehabilitation Directorate to develop a crisis care plan that safely reduces risk and supports to service-user to reduce the current crisis and use of crisis services.

§ To offer support to the psychiatric liaison multidisciplinary team regarding the management of frequent users and people in psychological distress.

§ To ensure the provision of brief high quality specialist psychological treatment to service-users and their families in psychiatric liaison services. Treatments will include evidence-based treatments for depression, anxiety disorders, psychosis, substance misuse, long-term conditions and personality disorder within the context of a general hospital (A&E department and inpatient wards).

§ To work closely and intensely with service-users identified by the Acute and Rehabilitation Directorate as frequent users of crisis services and requiring specialist input from psychological therapy.

§ To offer clinical supervision and consultation based on psychological knowledge and skills.

§ To utilise research skills for audit, measuring outcomes and contributing to research and training within the areas served by the team and service.

§ To be involved in service developments, as appropriate.

§ To work within professional guidelines and Inpatient and Acute policies and procedures.

1. To act as a highly specialist Psychologist by providing supervision, consultation and training including academic presentations to the team members and to other agencies.

2. To ensure own continued professional development, in line with BPS and HCPC guidelines.

3. To undertake own mandatory training.

4. To undertake a regular appraisal, developing a personal development plan that includes clinical competencies reflecting the health needs of the local population and relates to Trust strategy.

Research and Service Evaluation

1. To use theory and research to inform evidence based practice in work with groups, individuals, and their networks in line with current and best practice.

2. To undertake or participate in relevant clinical research, service evaluation and audit in line with service objectives.

3. To undertake project management including complex audit and service evaluation with colleagues within the service to help develop service provision.

General and Professional

1. To ensure the development, maintenance and dissemination of the highest professional standards of practice, through active participation in internal and external CPD training and development programs in accordance with Trust's clinical governance standards and the codes of practice and ethical guidelines of professional registration body.

2. To contribute to the development of best professional practice in psychology by taking part in regular supervision and appraisal and maintaining awareness of current developments in the field.

3. 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.

4. To maintain HCPC registration.

5. To maintain up to date knowledge of legislation, national and local policies and issues in relation to both the specific service user group and mental health.

Computer/Administration

1. To be computer literate and encourage implementation of the Trust's IM&T Strategy.

2. To ensure accurate recording of actions, and updating patient's records, maintaining confidentiality at all times.

3. To take part, and assist, in the planning and administration relating to day to day running of the caseload.

Person specification

Qualifications

Essential criteria

• Doctoral level qualification as a practitioner psychologist
• Professional registration with HCPC

Desirable criteria

• Higher post graduate qualification in relevant area

Experience

Essential criteria

• Significant post-qualification experience in working as a psychologist with service users presenting with complex mental health issues
• Experience of assessing and managing serious risk in relation to mental health issues
• Experience of working in multi-disciplinary teams
• Experience of delivering training, teaching and consultation to multi-disciplinary teams

Desirable criteria

• Experience of working in psychiatric liaison settings
• Experience of working in psychologically informed ways with physical health issues

Skills

Essential criteria

• Excellent communication skills- verbal and written
• Ability to work effectively, empathically and professionally in potentially highly stressful and emotive environments
• Supervisory skills- ability to supervise colleagues within psychological professions and other MDT disciplines

Benefits

We believe in bringing your authentic and best self to work, in order to deliver the best care to our patients. We are committed to supporting our employees holistically. Here is a snapshot of what is on offer at NELFT:

• A long-standing and award-winning approach to equality and diversity with supportive networks for ethnic minority staff, staff with disabilities or long term/chronic conditions and LGBT staff.
• A commitment to supporting colleagues to achieve a work life balance, through flexible working opportunities and our effortsto support our working parents and carers. This has resulted in us being recognised as a 'Top 10 Family Friendly Employer' from the Working Families Charity.
• Proactive health and wellbeing support, including access to our employee assistance programme, staff psychological support, individual wellbeing conversations and a network of health and wellbeing ambassadors.
• Detailed information about our wellbeing and benefits offer can be found in this link.

As a flexible working friendly organisation, we want to be sure that you can work in a way that is best for us and for our patients, and for you. Speak to us about how we might be able to accommodate a flexible working arrangement whether that's a job share, part time hours or another flexible pattern.

Supporting our Armed Forces

We recognise the valuable contribution that the Armed Forces community make to our organisation. We have signed the Armed Forces Covenant and achieved Gold Award under the Armed Forces Employer Recognition Scheme. We have supportive policies, guaranteed interview schemes for veterans. reservists and military spouses and give additional leave to our Reservists so that they can attend their annual camp.

Equal opportunities employer

We are committed to equal opportunities and diversity and positively encourage applications from all sections of the community regardless of any protected characteristic.

We are a Disability Confident employer and have made the pledge to commit to employing more people with disabilities. If you require this application in another format i.e. Braille or audio tape please contact the recruitment team on 0300 300 1530 or email recruitment@nelft.nhs.uk.

Correspondence with us

You are advised to regularly check your emails (including any junk mail/spam folders) for correspondence related to this post.

In the event of a high number of responses to any advert, NELFT reserves the right to close the vacancy early. If you do not hear from us within three weeks of the closing date then please assume you have not been successful on this occasion.

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.

Application numbers

We reserve the right to close this vacancy early if we receive sufficient applications for the role. Therefore, we encourage you to submit your application as soon as possible to ensure consideration.

If you require any additional support during the application process please contact recruitment@nelft.nhs.uk. We are happy to make reasonable adjustments to support you throughout the recruitment journey.
Documents to download

• Job description 8a Senior Psychologist (PDF, 520.3KB)
• NELFT Application - Hints and Tips (PDF, 38.4KB)