Job summary
The Early Intervention Teams in Widnes and St Helens are specialist secondary care community mental health teams who work with First Episode Psychosis. We are looking for a caring and committed person who is trained and accredited in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) to join us and be part of a large team of psychologists, CBT/EMDR therapists, occupational therapists, mental health nurses, support workers and psychiatrists.
You will be joining a hard working and busy team providing CBT for people who experience symptoms of psychosis and bipolar affective disorder. You will also be working with clients who experience severe anxiety related difficulties, depression and PTSD. Your role would be to provide CBT as per NICE guidance within our EI team.
We also have clients who sit on our At Risk Mental State (ARMS) pathway who require CBT for trauma, depression and anxiety but who may also experience milder psychotic-type symptoms.
The early intervention teams in Widnes and St Helens provides high quality intervention-based care for clients who have a GP in Halton, Warrington, Knowsley and St Helens.
You will receive regular supervision from a consultant clinical psychologist who is qualified in CBT for psychosis and bipolar affective disorder and be supported to follow CPD opportunities to further develop your career.
Please note there is 1 x Full-time post & 1 x Part-time post available.
Main duties of the job
To work as part of the multi-disciplinary teams based in Widnes and St Helens, providing a qualified specialist cognitive behavioural psychotherapy service to clients with psychosis and/or bipolar affective disorder.
To provide specialist psychological assessment and therapy, offering advice and consultation on client's psychological care to non-psychologist colleagues and to other, nonprofessional carers. To work autonomously within professional guidelines and the overall framework of the Directorate's and team's policies and procedures. To utilise research skills for audit, policy and service development and research within the area served by the team/service.
About us
Mersey Care is one of the largest trusts providing physical health and mental health services in the North West, serving more than 1.4 million people across our region and are also commissioned for services that cover the North West, North Wales and the Midlands.
We offer specialist inpatient and community services that support physical and mental health and specialist inpatient mental health, learning disability, addiction and brain injury services. Mersey Care is one of only three trusts in the UK that offer high secure mental health facilities.
At the heart of all we do is our commitment to 'perfect care' - care that is safe, effective, positively experienced, timely, equitable and efficient. We support our staff to do the best job they can and work alongside service users, their families, and carers to design and develop future services together. We're currently delivering a programme of organisational and service transformation to significantly improve the quality of the services we provide and safely reduce cost as we do so.
Flexible working requests will be considered for all roles.
Job description
Job responsibilities
To provide specialist psychological assessments of clients referred to the team based upon the appropriate use, interpretation and integration of complex data from a variety of sources including psychological tests, self-report measures, rating scales, direct and indirect structured observations and semi-structured interviews with clients, family members and others involved in the clients care.
To formulate and implement plans for the formal psychological treatment and/or management of a clients psychological problems, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the clients problems, and employing methods based upon evidence of efficacy.
To be responsible for implementing a range of psychological interventions for individuals, carers, families and groups, within and across teams employed individually and in synthesis, adjusting and refining psychological formulations drawing upon different explanatory models and maintaining a number of provisional hypotheses where appropriate.
To evaluate and make decisions about treatment options taking into account both theoretical and therapeutic models and highly complex factors concerning historical and developmental processes that have shaped the individual, family or group.
To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment, treatment and discharge of clients whose problems are managed by psychologically based standard care plans.
To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment and treatment of clients whose problems are managed by psychologically based enhanced care plans.
To provide specialist psychological advice, guidance and consultation to other professionals contributing directly to clients formulation, diagnosis and treatment plan.
To contribute directly and indirectly to a psychologically based framework of understanding and care to the benefit of all clients of the service, across all settings and agencies serving the client group.
To undertake risk assessment and risk management for individual clients and to provide advice to other professions on psychological aspects of risk assessment and risk management.
To communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner, information concerning the assessment, formulation and treatment plans of clients under their care and to monitor progress during the course of both unidiscplinary and multidisciplinary care.
Please refer to attached Job Description and Person Specification for full list of duties and responsibilities.
Job description
Job responsibilities
To provide specialist psychological assessments of clients referred to the team based upon the appropriate use, interpretation and integration of complex data from a variety of sources including psychological tests, self-report measures, rating scales, direct and indirect structured observations and semi-structured interviews with clients, family members and others involved in the clients care.
To formulate and implement plans for the formal psychological treatment and/or management of a clients psychological problems, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the clients problems, and employing methods based upon evidence of efficacy.
To be responsible for implementing a range of psychological interventions for individuals, carers, families and groups, within and across teams employed individually and in synthesis, adjusting and refining psychological formulations drawing upon different explanatory models and maintaining a number of provisional hypotheses where appropriate.
To evaluate and make decisions about treatment options taking into account both theoretical and therapeutic models and highly complex factors concerning historical and developmental processes that have shaped the individual, family or group.
To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment, treatment and discharge of clients whose problems are managed by psychologically based standard care plans.
To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment and treatment of clients whose problems are managed by psychologically based enhanced care plans.
To provide specialist psychological advice, guidance and consultation to other professionals contributing directly to clients formulation, diagnosis and treatment plan.
To contribute directly and indirectly to a psychologically based framework of understanding and care to the benefit of all clients of the service, across all settings and agencies serving the client group.
To undertake risk assessment and risk management for individual clients and to provide advice to other professions on psychological aspects of risk assessment and risk management.
To communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner, information concerning the assessment, formulation and treatment plans of clients under their care and to monitor progress during the course of both unidiscplinary and multidisciplinary care.
Please refer to attached Job Description and Person Specification for full list of duties and responsibilities.
Person Specification
QUALIFICATIONS
Essential
- Post Graduate Diploma, or equivalent Post Graduate level CBT training certificate which confers eligibility for BABCP accreditation
- Has BABCP accreditation or able to achieve Provisional Accreditation within one year
Desirable
- Relevant professional qualification (e.g. Nursing, social work, Allied Health Professional etc.)
KNOWLEDGE/ EXPERIENCE
Essential
- Demonstrable experience of working in mental health services.
- A range of experience of delivering Cognitive Behavioural Therapy to adults.
- Ability to meet agreed/specified service targets.
- Ability to manage own caseload and time.
- Demonstrates high standards in written communication.
- Able to write clear reports and letters to referrers.
- Experience with routine outcome monitoring.
- Experience of teaching/training and liaising with other professional groups.
- Significant experience working as a psychological therapy practitioner and can demonstrates the competences as required.
- Demonstrates an understanding of anxiety and depression and how it may present in Primary Care.
- Demonstrates knowledge of the issues surrounding work and the impact it can have on mental health / benefits & employment systems.
- Knowledge of medication used in anxiety and depression and other common mental health problems.
- Demonstrates an understanding for the need to use evidence based psychological therapies and how it relates to this post.
- Knowledge of child protection issues and other relevant legislation.
- Able to attend supervision training if not already trained, and other training as the post develops.
- Good record of Continuing Professional Development and willingness to continue this.
Desirable
- Experience of working in Primary Care Services treating anxiety and depression.
- Worked in a service where agreed targets in place demonstrating clinical outcomes.
VALUES
Essential
- Continuous Improvement
- Accountability
- Respectfulness
- Enthusiasm
- Support
- High professional standards
- Responsive to service users
- Engaging leadership style
- Strong customer service belief
- Transparency and honesty
- Discreet
- Change oriented
SKILLS
Essential
- Full range of skills and competencies as laid out in the competence framework for CBT (Roth and Pilling 2007).
- Computer literate.
- Well developed skills in the ability to communicate effectively, orally and in writing, complex, highly technical and/or clinically sensitive information to clients, their families, carers and other professional colleagues both within and outside the NHS.
- Has received training (either formal of through experience) and carried out risk assessments within scope of practice.
- Able to develop good therapeutic relationships with clients.
- High level of enthusiasm and Motivation.
- Advanced communication skills.
- Ability to work within a team and foster good working relationships.
- Ability to use clinical supervision and personal development positively and effectively.
- Ability to work under pressure.
- Regard for others and respect for individual rights of autonomy and confidentiality.
- Ability to be self reflective, whilst working with individuals, & in own personal and professional development and in supervision.
- The ability and skills to act as an advocate for a new service, to engage and foster good professional relationships with all health professionals in promoting the good integration of this service with the wider health and social care system.
Desirable
- Trained in provision of supervision for CBT.
- Accredited with a professional psychological therapy organisation
- Completed clinical audits within a service.
- Car driver and/or ability and willingness to travel to locations throughout the organisation.
- Fluent in languages other than English
Person Specification
QUALIFICATIONS
Essential
- Post Graduate Diploma, or equivalent Post Graduate level CBT training certificate which confers eligibility for BABCP accreditation
- Has BABCP accreditation or able to achieve Provisional Accreditation within one year
Desirable
- Relevant professional qualification (e.g. Nursing, social work, Allied Health Professional etc.)
KNOWLEDGE/ EXPERIENCE
Essential
- Demonstrable experience of working in mental health services.
- A range of experience of delivering Cognitive Behavioural Therapy to adults.
- Ability to meet agreed/specified service targets.
- Ability to manage own caseload and time.
- Demonstrates high standards in written communication.
- Able to write clear reports and letters to referrers.
- Experience with routine outcome monitoring.
- Experience of teaching/training and liaising with other professional groups.
- Significant experience working as a psychological therapy practitioner and can demonstrates the competences as required.
- Demonstrates an understanding of anxiety and depression and how it may present in Primary Care.
- Demonstrates knowledge of the issues surrounding work and the impact it can have on mental health / benefits & employment systems.
- Knowledge of medication used in anxiety and depression and other common mental health problems.
- Demonstrates an understanding for the need to use evidence based psychological therapies and how it relates to this post.
- Knowledge of child protection issues and other relevant legislation.
- Able to attend supervision training if not already trained, and other training as the post develops.
- Good record of Continuing Professional Development and willingness to continue this.
Desirable
- Experience of working in Primary Care Services treating anxiety and depression.
- Worked in a service where agreed targets in place demonstrating clinical outcomes.
VALUES
Essential
- Continuous Improvement
- Accountability
- Respectfulness
- Enthusiasm
- Support
- High professional standards
- Responsive to service users
- Engaging leadership style
- Strong customer service belief
- Transparency and honesty
- Discreet
- Change oriented
SKILLS
Essential
- Full range of skills and competencies as laid out in the competence framework for CBT (Roth and Pilling 2007).
- Computer literate.
- Well developed skills in the ability to communicate effectively, orally and in writing, complex, highly technical and/or clinically sensitive information to clients, their families, carers and other professional colleagues both within and outside the NHS.
- Has received training (either formal of through experience) and carried out risk assessments within scope of practice.
- Able to develop good therapeutic relationships with clients.
- High level of enthusiasm and Motivation.
- Advanced communication skills.
- Ability to work within a team and foster good working relationships.
- Ability to use clinical supervision and personal development positively and effectively.
- Ability to work under pressure.
- Regard for others and respect for individual rights of autonomy and confidentiality.
- Ability to be self reflective, whilst working with individuals, & in own personal and professional development and in supervision.
- The ability and skills to act as an advocate for a new service, to engage and foster good professional relationships with all health professionals in promoting the good integration of this service with the wider health and social care system.
Desirable
- Trained in provision of supervision for CBT.
- Accredited with a professional psychological therapy organisation
- Completed clinical audits within a service.
- Car driver and/or ability and willingness to travel to locations throughout the organisation.
- Fluent in languages other than English
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).
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.
UK Registration
Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see
NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).
