Job summary
This is an exciting opportunity for a qualified practitioner psychologist who is enthusiastic about working with children with physical health and/or complex neurodevelopmental conditions to join a new Community Children's Psychology Service at London Evelina where we serve the communities of Lambeth and Southwark. As a HCPC registered psychologist you will have the opportunity to develop existing knowledge and clinical skills within paediatric settings as well as gaining skills and experience in service development as we set up this new service. This role would appeal especially to candidates with a specialist interest in paediatrics and neurodevelopmental conditions. We welcome applications from trainee clinical psychologists due to complete their training in 2024. We are currently recruiting for 2 posts, both are available from 1st October 2024.
Our service is recognised for being accessible to patients and staff, and strives to be as representative of the local population as possible. We would particularly welcome applicants who can complement the diversity of the existing team.
We regret that we are unable to advise candidates if they have not been shortlisted. If you have not heard from us within two weeks of the closing date, please assume that you have been unsuccessful on this occasion. In the event of an excessive number of applicants the Trust reserves the right to close this vacancy earlier than indicated.
Main duties of the job
The post holder will provide psychological assessment, formulation and intervention for neurodivergent children and young people, and those with physical health conditions, and their families. This role will also involve the assessment of neurodevelopmental conditions as part of the paediatric multi-disciplinary team. As this is a new service, these posts provide a unique opportunity to help shape a service to meet the needs of children and their families requiring paediatric community services, living in Lambeth and Southwark.
The post holders will join a small team of clinical psychologists within Children's Community Services. The psychology team sits within Evelina Neurosciences, which has a strong psychology presence.
While we hope to appointment to these posts on a full-time basis, we recognise that flexibility and work-life balance are a key component in recruiting the best quality staff for this population. We are therefore open to applications on a part-time or job share basis. If you are applying on less than a full-time basis, please state this, along with your ideal number of hours in your supporting statement. If you are applying as an already established job share, please note that all job share applicants must make individual applications, be shortlisted and interviewed individually.
Please contact us to discuss any individual requirements you may have.
About us
Guys and St Thomas NHS Foundation Trust
Children's community services
We provide a comprehensive range of services for the 127,000 children and young people that live in Lambeth and Southwark. Universal services include health visiting, family nurse partnership, school nursing, nutrition and dietetics, and a newborn hearing screening programme. Our specialist services cover community paediatrics, speech and language therapy, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, complex needs nursing, sickle cell and audiology. As well as part of statutory services including looked after children, child protection, safeguarding, and adoption and fostering.
We have two main health centres, Mary Sheridan Centre in Lambeth and Sunshine House in Southwark but we have many more across Lambeth and Southwark.
The Children's Community Paediatric Psychology Service is a new uni-disciplinary service to promote psychological and emotional wellbeing in children with complex developmental difficulties and their families. The service works closely with MDT community paediatrics colleagues to promote psychological thinking, provide high quality assessments and brief interventions, at an individual, family and group level. As a new service, job roles will evolve with time and all members of the team are expected to be involved in ongoing service evaluation and clinical audit.
Job description
Job responsibilities
Job Summary
Under supervision of the senior practitioner psychologist, the post-holder will contribute to the ongoing development and delivery of a high quality Community Paediatric Psychology Service at the Evelina Childrens Community Services. The provision of evidenced-based, time-limited psychological assessments and interventions to promote psychological well-being in the context of is a key requirement.
The post-holder will exercise autonomous professional responsibility for his/her own actions and will provide assessment, therapeutic interventions, and psychosocial support to patients and their families (including 1-1 and groups), and play a role in the development of psychologically informed working practice within the areas. Group therapy support may occur on a needs basis.
The post-holder will work within the Childrens Community Psychology team, based in the Childrens Community Service, under Evelina London.
The post holder will utilise research skills for audit, policy and service development and research. She/he will work autonomously within clearly defined policies and procedures of the Paediatric Psychology service, professional guidelines and the overall framework of the teams policies and procedures.
Job description
Job responsibilities
Job Summary
Under supervision of the senior practitioner psychologist, the post-holder will contribute to the ongoing development and delivery of a high quality Community Paediatric Psychology Service at the Evelina Childrens Community Services. The provision of evidenced-based, time-limited psychological assessments and interventions to promote psychological well-being in the context of is a key requirement.
The post-holder will exercise autonomous professional responsibility for his/her own actions and will provide assessment, therapeutic interventions, and psychosocial support to patients and their families (including 1-1 and groups), and play a role in the development of psychologically informed working practice within the areas. Group therapy support may occur on a needs basis.
The post-holder will work within the Childrens Community Psychology team, based in the Childrens Community Service, under Evelina London.
The post holder will utilise research skills for audit, policy and service development and research. She/he will work autonomously within clearly defined policies and procedures of the Paediatric Psychology service, professional guidelines and the overall framework of the teams policies and procedures.
Person Specification
Qualifications
Essential
- Doctoral level qualification in clinical psychology (or equivalent for those who trained before 1996) as accredited by BPS.
- Eligibility for Chartered status with the BPS.
Professional/statutory Registration
Essential
- Health And Care Professions Council (HCPC) Registration as Practitioner Psychologist
Previous experience
Essential
- Experience of psychological assessment, formulation and treatment of children and young people with physical health and/or neurodevelopmental conditions and their families.
- Experience of undertaking and interpreting neuropsychological assessments and writing reports based on the results
- Experience of providing both group based and individual psychological interventions.
- Experience of the application of psychology in different cultural contexts.
Desirable
- Experience in providing consultation to other professional and non-professional groups in the area of physical health.
- Experience in the assessment of ASD, ADHD and Intellectual Disability
Skills/Knowledge/Ability
Essential
- A strong ability to communicate at both a written and oral level, imparting complex, highly technical and clinically sensitive information to patients, their families, and carers and a wide range of lay and professional people within and outside the NHS. This may require negotiating, motivating, training, reassuring others and demonstrating empathy.
- Experience and ability to undertake risk assessments of clients in relation to self and others, and refer on to appropriate services as necessary.
- Ability to work effectively within a multidisciplinary team and contribute to effective team functioning.
- Ability to identify, provide and promote appropriate means of support to carers and staff exposed to highly distressing situations and challenging interactions.
Desirable
- Specialist knowledge about psychological theories and interventions in the areas of physical health and neurodivergence.
- Ability to adapt psychological interventions to meet the needs of neurodivergent children and young people and those with physical health conditions.
Additional Information
Essential
- Enthusiasm for a broad range of psychological phenomena, an interest in models of service delivery, and an ability to articulate the value added by clinical/health psychology services within the context of multi-disciplinary physical health care services setting.
- A commitment to promoting equality of opportunity through all aspects of working and professional practice with both colleagues and all client groups.
- Well developed IT skills including data entry and analysis of research data using Microsoft programmes and appropriate statistical packages such as SPSS
Person Specification
Qualifications
Essential
- Doctoral level qualification in clinical psychology (or equivalent for those who trained before 1996) as accredited by BPS.
- Eligibility for Chartered status with the BPS.
Professional/statutory Registration
Essential
- Health And Care Professions Council (HCPC) Registration as Practitioner Psychologist
Previous experience
Essential
- Experience of psychological assessment, formulation and treatment of children and young people with physical health and/or neurodevelopmental conditions and their families.
- Experience of undertaking and interpreting neuropsychological assessments and writing reports based on the results
- Experience of providing both group based and individual psychological interventions.
- Experience of the application of psychology in different cultural contexts.
Desirable
- Experience in providing consultation to other professional and non-professional groups in the area of physical health.
- Experience in the assessment of ASD, ADHD and Intellectual Disability
Skills/Knowledge/Ability
Essential
- A strong ability to communicate at both a written and oral level, imparting complex, highly technical and clinically sensitive information to patients, their families, and carers and a wide range of lay and professional people within and outside the NHS. This may require negotiating, motivating, training, reassuring others and demonstrating empathy.
- Experience and ability to undertake risk assessments of clients in relation to self and others, and refer on to appropriate services as necessary.
- Ability to work effectively within a multidisciplinary team and contribute to effective team functioning.
- Ability to identify, provide and promote appropriate means of support to carers and staff exposed to highly distressing situations and challenging interactions.
Desirable
- Specialist knowledge about psychological theories and interventions in the areas of physical health and neurodivergence.
- Ability to adapt psychological interventions to meet the needs of neurodivergent children and young people and those with physical health conditions.
Additional Information
Essential
- Enthusiasm for a broad range of psychological phenomena, an interest in models of service delivery, and an ability to articulate the value added by clinical/health psychology services within the context of multi-disciplinary physical health care services setting.
- A commitment to promoting equality of opportunity through all aspects of working and professional practice with both colleagues and all client groups.
- Well developed IT skills including data entry and analysis of research data using Microsoft programmes and appropriate statistical packages such as SPSS
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.
Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).
From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).
UK Registration
Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see
NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).
Additional information
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.
Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).
From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).
UK Registration
Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see
NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).
