Clinical Psychologist

Job responsibilities

Job title: Clinical Psychologist

Directorate: Operations

Reports to: Lead Clinical Psychologist

Grade: Band 7 equivalent

Purpose of the job:

To provide a high-quality specialist Clinical Psychology service within a neurorehabilitation setting, including neuropsychological assessment, psychological formulation and psychological therapy for clients. This will include individual and group interventions and may require joint working with family members and carers.

To be a Clinical Psychology resource and promote psychological theory and practice in relation to acquired brain injury (ABI) within the interdisciplinary team at Shaftesbury Icanho and to the wider professional community as required.

Main duties:

To undertake specialist neuropsychological assessments with clients. This will involve the appropriate use, interpretation and integration of complex psychological data from a variety of sources, including clinical interviews and standardised neuropsychological tests.

To use the information from assessment to produce psychological formulations to help clients and the interdisciplinary team to make sense of the clients presentation.

To formulate and implement individual psychological intervention.

To facilitate psychologically-informed therapy groups. In some cases this will mean co-facilitation with other members of the clinical team.

To undertake risk assessment and management for individual clients and provide advice to other disciplines on psychological aspects of risk assessment management.

To provide psychologically-informed training and education to the clinical team.

To participate in team meetings to promote psychological theory within the clinical team.

To develop skills to provide specialist psychological consultation and reflective practice, in order to support the team to provide the appropriate level of psychological intervention to clients (i.e. psychological support levels 1 and 2).

To participate in interdisciplinary and multi-agency meetings concerning the delivery and development of the clinical service for clients.

To ensure a high standard of communication with carers, families, mental health services and other organisations pertinent to the delivery of the Icanho service.

To assist in the development of an ethos and clinical practice which is robust to external and internal scrutiny, and to promote evidence-based practice. To contribute to the undertaking of service evaluation and audit work within the psychology department and the wider service as agreed with the Lead Clinical Psychologist and Service Managers.

To support research in an appropriate capacity, including liaison with local universities.

To participate in, and deliver presentations, workshops, teaching and training internally to clients/carers and the Icanho interdisciplinary team and externally as appropriate.

To be responsible for, and be able to, evidence own personal and continuous professional development by undertaking relevant training, attending meetings and conferences. This will be in line with your personal development plan (in line with BPS guidelines) agreed with the Lead Clinical Psychologist and in line with the strategic development for the service.

To ensure that Clinical Psychology reports are written in a timely manner that reflects highly specialist knowledge and skill, and to maintain the highest standard of clinical record keeping.

To exercise full autonomous professional responsibility for the psychological assessment, treatment and discharge of clients.

To establish a high level of competence in utilisation of: computer-based tools of analysis, spreadsheets, databases and statistical packages contributing to accuracy of data collection, outcome measures and audit/research.

To maintain an up-to-date knowledge of relevant development and research in the field of brain injury rehabilitation, to inform evidence-based practice.

To receive regular management and clinical supervision which complies with Shaftesbury policy and procedures, and HCPC and BPS requirements.

To exercise responsibility and professional judgement for the appropriate and safe use of specialist psychological equipment and appropriate systems of stock control.

To comply with all Shaftesbury Health and Safety policies in order to ensure that a safe working environment is maintained for clients, carers, staff and visitors.

To be aware of current legislation e.g. POVA, (Safeguarding), Mental Capacity Act and the Disability Discrimination Act and their relevance to practice.

To adhere to all clinical governance policies and procedures.

This post communicates with:

Internal:

All disciplines

Clinical Lead

Administration

Management

External:

• Primary and secondary physical health care services
• Other psychological services
• Mental health services
• Other rehabilitation services
• Social care/local authorities and educational authorities
• Employers and vocational support teams
• Relevant third sector organisations and voluntary groups
• Legal teams and case managers
• Universities

Other information:

• Due to the nature of the work, this post will require you to travel to and work from our base in Stowmarket, Suffolk.

A small percentage of the work of this post holder will, of necessity, take place in the clients homes and in the community.

The post holder will be required to hold a current driving licence and the use of own vehicle for home visits.

Other additional duties may be required as agreed with the service manager and Lead Clinical Psychologist.

Qualifications

Essential

• Training to a doctoral level in Clinical Psychology, as accredited by the BPS.
• Specifically, to include models of psychopathology and neuropsychology.

Desirable

• Pre-qualification training and qualification in research methodology and/or other fields of applied psychology.

Knowledge and Skills

Essential

• Knowledge of psychological models (for example, CBT, CFT and/or ACT).
• Knowledge of the theory and practice of psychological models and therapies in client groups that may need adaptions (i.e. people with additional disabilities)
• Knowledge of psychological approaches to rehabilitation after acquired brain injury.
• Doctoral level knowledge of research methodology as practiced within the clinical field of psychology.
• Ability to identify and employ mechanisms of clinical governance as appropriate to support and maintain clinical practice.
• Skills in the use of standardised neuropsychological assessment, psychological formulation and intervention.
• Skills in running therapy groups.
• Well-developed skills in the communication of complex or sensitive information.
• Skills in adapting communication style dependent on audience.
• To be autonomous, organised and able to manage own workload.
• To be able to utilise supervision, including planning and preparation.
• To be a self-reflective practitioner, able to identify own strengths and weaknesses, and able to take on feedback.

Desirable

• Knowledge of neurology, the brain and brain injury
• Knowledge of legislation in relation to people with acquired brain injury.
• Ability to work well with individuals at all levels, both within and outside the organisation.
• Well-developed and proven research skills and the ability to develop these in others.
• Skills in providing consultation to other professional and non-professional groups.

Experience

Essential

• Experience of psychological assessment, formulation and intervention with clients in clinical services.
• Experience of working with a wide variety of client groups, across a whole life course and with presenting problems that reflect the full range of clinical severity.
• Experience of maintaining a high degree of professionalism in the face of highly emotive and distressing problems, and process issues that challenge in therapy.

Desirable

• Experience of working with clients who have had a brain injury or other neurological conditions.
• Experience of application of Clinical Psychology in different cultural contexts
• Experience of undertaking, being involved in a research team and/or publishing original research.
• Experience with using at least two evidence based psychological therapies such as CBT or Third Wave Therapies (e.g. CFT or ACT).

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

UK Registration

Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).