Eating Disorders Parent/Carer Peer Support Worker

Job responsibilities

Key Responsibilities

Central and North West London NHS Trust is committed to providing safe, effective services and providing those who use the services; and those who support them, with a positive experience.

Clinical Responsibilities

1. To work with the multi-disciplinary teams across both the adult and child and adolescent eating disorder service in the support of parents/carers of young people accessing eating disorder services, ensuring the needs or parents/carers are met through promoting strengths-based practice
2. To assume a coaching role supporting parent/carers in thinking about their own personal recovery plans in relation to being a parent/carer; this can be delivered individually or in groups.
3. To be supported to develop, create promotional materials and undertake a carers clinic - a one to one, short term intervention for friends and family of the current cohort of service users, supporting them to develop skills and attend to their own mental health while being in the caring role
4. To work with members of the MDT to create and utilise evaluation tools in order to assess the impact of the role
5. To assist parents/carers to identify their own strengths, personal interests and goals, emphasising the importance of their own wellbeing in order to best support the person accessing services.
6. To support parents/carers in making sense of the experiences of mental and emotional distress of the young person they are parent/carer to and involving the young person in these conversations as much as possible and appropriate. This might include understandings of personal and social recovery, health and wellbeing, personal and social identity whilst recognising that each individuals recovery is a distinctive and deeply personal process.
7. To support parents/carers in making sense of their own experiences of mental and emotional distress in relation to the challenges the young person is facing, being highly sensitive to their use of language and descriptions of experiences.
8. To share wisdom, mentor around recovery processes and demonstrate coping skills, using own experience of caring for a young person who has experienced recovery from an eating disorder.
9. To act as a role model to inspire hope, share life experiences and lessons learned as a person who has cared for a young person in recovery.
10. To work with some autonomy with complex safety considerations for individuals across community and inpatient contexts
11. Working jointly with highly skilled colleagues from a variety of professional backgrounds to develop and co-facilitate carer interventions and ensure co-production is modelled within the care provided
12. To be attuned to sensitive safeguarding issues as they may present within the relevant cohort of patients, their friends and family and is able to utilise supervision to ensure safety and risk is managed in a recovery focussed, timely manner
13. To attend team meetings and contribute to the assessment, planning, implementation and review of care with the multi-disciplinary team.
14. To work together with the young person and their parents/carers in the drawing up of care plans, encouraging and motivating young people and their parents/carers to take an active role in the care plan.
15. To incorporate and promote the Triangle of Care within MDT working practice and decision making.
16. To positively promote and support parents/carers engagement in the community by maintaining extensive knowledge and links with community resources and actively supporting parents/carers to access them, maximising parents/carers opportunities for socially valued roles and positive identity.
17. To assist in the development and implementation of educational and peer facilitated parent/carer support groups and activities.
18. To assist parents/carers to maintain a connection with their life beyond being a parent/carer of a young person accessing services.
19. To accept and respect parent/carers personal beliefs, uniqueness and identity.

Communication

1. To form professional peer-based relationships with young people, their parent(s)/carer(s) and family, communicating with them in a way that respects their views, autonomy and culture.
2. To meet, welcome, introduce and orientate the young person, their parent/carer and families to the service.
3. To support the parent/carers to prepare for meetings regarding the care of the young person as appropriate e.g. assessments, CPA meetings etc.
4. To help parents/carers to access information on health promotion, mental and physical wellbeing.
5. To develop good working relationships with the multidisciplinary team, liaising with other agencies as appropriate.
6. To monitor the young person and parent/carers progress, reporting any progress and areas of concern to the multi-disciplinary team (verbally & electronic record keeping systems).
7. To assist the parents/carers to understand their rights and choices within the service.
8. Report any untoward incidents or unusual occurrences to the manager/senior clinician immediately.
9. To ensure that communication with young people, their parents/carers and families, other staff and general public reflects Trust values at all times.

Service Development and Delivery

1. To maintain up to date knowledge of legislation, national and local policies and issues in relation to eating disorders, peer support, Carers Act and mental health.
2. To comply with all relevant Trust policies, procedures and guidelines, including those relating to Equal Opportunities, Health and Safety and Confidentiality of Information and to be aware of any changes in these.
3. To be aware of, teach others and challenge issues in relation to stigma, low expectations and anti-discriminatory practice as appropriate.
4. To read and understand the statutory requirements of the Mental Health Act 1983 and Childrens Act.
5. To attend clinical, business & service development meetings as required.
6. To raise the profile of peer support both within CNWL, and externally, through co-delivery of presentations, workshops, and participation in Trustwide peer related projects and audits: and information sharing as required and as agreed with the line manager.

Learning and Development

1. To participate in Trust mandatory training & development opportunities considered appropriate to the PSWs role and as identified in the Personal Development Plan (PDP).
2. To undertake the accredited Developing Expertise in Peer Support Level 4 module delivered through City University.
3. To contribute and commit to undertaking an annual Development review/Appraisal.
4. To engage in Peer Support supervision as stated in our Trustwide policies.
5. To receive regular line management supervision as arranged by the team manager.
6. To make full use of supervision, peer support with other peer workers and other support as necessary in order to remain well and safe in the parent/carer peer support role, and in order to work with the challenges of using lived experience to support people with potentially difficult and distressing issues.

Documentation

1. To ensure timely and accurate recording of clinical related data and information on the electronic patient record system.

Education and Qualifications

Essential

• Commitment to obtain underpinning knowledge through work based learning and mandatory training Completion of Level 4 City University accredited course "Developing Expertise in Peer Support" course.

Desirable

• Accredited certificate in Life Coaching
• Accredited peer support worker training

Previous Experience

Essential

• Own personal lived experience of caring for a young person who has experienced recovery from an eating disorder
• Own personal lived experience of caring for a young person who has accessed Eating Disorder Services
• Paid or unpaid working experience in health and social care
• Developed plans for managing own wellbeing
• Willing to positively share own life experiences, and personal experience of caring for someone with an eating disorder with young people, parents/carers and families
• Experience of actively supporting individuals to identify and work towards achieving personal goals in a related social care or health setting (paid or unpaid)

Desirable

• Paid or unpaid peer support worker experience
• Paid or unpaid experience of working with individuals with an eating disorder
• Paid or unpaid experience of working with parents/carers/families

Skills, Knowledge and Abilities

Essential

• Ability to demonstrate first person experiential knowledge of recovery
• Ability to demonstrate knowledge of the concept of personal recovery as it may apply to others
• Evidence of good interpersonal skills and an ability to form peer relationships with service users and carers
• Effective listening skills
• Ability to communicate on all levels and to a broad scope of individuals, both internally and externally to the Trust
• Ability to appreciate / understand other people's worlds
• Ability to demonstrate empathy, compassion and patience
• An ability to be non-judgemental
• An ability to act calmly and to respond in a professional manner to distress, disturbance and unpredictability
• Knowledge of how to build community links and networks
• Ability to problem solve and create innovative solutions to help empower service users
• Understanding of issues arising from experiencing mental ill health
• Ability to work unsupervised in a range of settings
• Sensitive understanding of diversity issues and an ability to promote anti discriminatory practice/ equal opportunities
• Ability to demonstrate practical skills to provide support with daily living activities
• Resilience
• Good organisational skills
• Effective team player

Desirable

• Knowledge of basic food hygiene
• Knowledge of basic first aid
• Basic Health and Safety awareness
• Moving and handling awareness
• Awareness of local services
• Knowledge of benefits/ employment systems
• Ability to demonstrate a good understanding of mental health issues
• Ability to speak other languages

Other

Essential

• A preparedness to work flexible hours through prior arrangement as the needs of the job dictate (e.g. some evenings & weekends)
• Ability to travel between locations using own or public transport

Numeracy and Literacy

Essential

• Acceptable level of written literacy and numeracy
• Basic IT skills i.e. word & email

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.

Certificate of Sponsorship

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).