Band 7 Senior Practitioner - Gloucester

Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust; Falfield; On-site; GBP 42,000 - 56,000; Full time

Job summary

Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust is seeking a Senior Practitioner to lead developing Intensive Service at HMP Eastwood Park. You will manage two team members, coordinate Mental Health Act transfers, and case-manage women through admission to ensure safe return to prison.

Key responsibilities include clinical leadership, risk management, safeguarding oversight and shaping pathways with partners to reduce delays and improve outcomes for women detained under the Mental Health

Qualifications

• Registered Mental Health Nurse (RMN) or Registered Social Worker with post-registration experience.
• Knowledge of Mental Health Act, Mental Capacity Act and safeguarding.
• Experience in complex assessment, care planning and risk management.
• Leadership or management experience is desirable.

Responsibilities

• Provide day-to-day clinical leadership for the Intensive pathway.
• Offer clinical and managerial supervision to the Intensive team.
• Develop and disseminate care packages with evidence-based interventions.
• Hold a clinical caseload and supervise staff ensuring governance.
• Coordinate transfers to hospital and remittance to prison when appropriate.
• Lead on triage, assessment and allocation of referrals with Team Managers.
• Contribute to staff training and development.
• Build inclusive, trauma-informed care across services and partners.

Skills

Clinical leadership

Supervision

Risk management

Safeguarding

Communication

Education

RMN or Registered Social Worker

Job description

Job overview

Are you an experienced mental health professional ready to lead an innovative service for women with complex needs?

We are seeking a compassionate Senior Practitioner to lead developing Intensive Service at HMP Eastwood Park. You will manage and supervise two team members, coordinate Mental Health Act transfers to and from hospital, case-manage women during admission, and support their safe return to prison. Through proactive assessment, relapse prevention and evidence-based interventions, you will help reduce delays and improve women's mental health outcomes.

Working with prison, probation, hospital, community and multidisciplinary colleagues, you will provide clinical leadership, supervision, risk management and safeguarding oversight. You will also shape pathways, strengthen governance and champion inclusive, trauma-informed care.

You must be a registered Mental Health Nurse or Social Worker with substantial post-registration experience, knowledge of the Mental Health Act, Mental Capacity Act and safeguarding, with skills in complex assessment, care planning, supervision and team management.

Help develop a new service and make a lasting difference. Flexibility, collaboration and excellent communication are essential. Prison security clearance is required, and travel may be necessary. Join AWP and bring our PRIDE values to life: Passion, Respect, Integrity, Diversity and Excellence.

Main duties of the job

We have been commissioned to develop and deliver, during the remainder of the contract period, a dedicated specialist team focused on improving the mental health pathway for women detained within HMP Eastwood Park who are either at risk of transfer or require transfer to hospital under Part III of the Mental Health Act. This is a significant and high-profile area of work, designed to address the complex needs of women within the criminal justice system and improve outcomes for some of the most vulnerable individuals in our care As the Senior Practitioner, you will provide leadership and operational management to this specialist team, ensuring effective coordination of transfers to hospital and oversight of individual care pathways. You will case manage women throughout their admission, maintain close liaison with inpatient teams, and facilitate timely and appropriate remittance to prison once treatment goals have been achieved and individuals are clinically stable. A key element of the role will be the prevention of deterioration and relapse through proactive intervention, early identification of risk, and collaborative care planning. Working closely with prison staff, healthcare providers, and partner agencies, you will help reduce the need for hospital admissions wherever possible while ensuring that those requiring specialist treatment receive timely access to appropriate services.

Working for our organisation

We are the lead provider of healthcare for people with serious mental illness, learning disabilities and autism across Bath and North East Somerset (BaNES), Swindon and Wiltshire, and Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire.

We aim to provide High Quality, Compassionate Care everywhere, every day. This means our services will be safe, clinically effective and provide a positive all round experience for our patients, families and carers. And we believe passionately in treating everyone with kindness, respect and empathy.

Key to this is providing a supportive and safe environment for our 4,000 staff where we all feel welcome and able to do the best we can for those we support. Our staff and teams work incredibly hard delivering services across more than 90 locations, covering 2,200miles, to more than 1.8million people.

At AWP we actively encourage applicants from all backgrounds; we are particularly keen to encourage applications from people from Black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds, those with disabilities and from the LGBTQ+ community. We want people to bring their unique blend of experiences, backgrounds, perspectives and knowledge to AWP, as diversity makes us stronger.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Provide day-to-day clinical leadership and oversight of the Intensive pathway. This will include ensuring we have the right processes in place that adhere to safe governance principles and policy.

Offer clinical supervision and managerial supervision to the Intensive team and other members of the MDT as required

Develop and disseminate packages of care which may include a variety of evidenced based interventions that work with women

Hold a clinical caseloads appropriate, with adherence to professional registration as well as attending your own clinical supervision.

Provide first-line support for staff in managing clinical risk and safeguarding concerns.

Provide first line support for staff in managing clinical risk and safeguarding concerns ensuring appropriate escalation and multi -agency collaboration.

Work closely with Team Managers to support effective triage, assessment and allocation of referrals.

Contribute to the training and development of all staff to ensure they are equipped with the necessary knowledge, attitude and capabilities to operate effectively in an inclusive, value driven service.

Work with the mental health workforce and our partners to identify people with complex needs and where they go to for the right help.

Champion inclusion and accessibility, identifying and addressing health inequalities in service delivery.

Build relationships across services to ensure joint delivery of care.

Use the acquired skills, knowledge and abilities to deliver a service based within the police and court settings that builds on and reinforces but does not replace those initiatives that already exist within these environments.

Person specification

Qualifications

Essential criteria

• Registered Mental Health Nurse (RMN) OR Registered Social worker (CQSW or DipSW)
• Significant evidence of post registration professional development

Desirable criteria

• Leadership or management qualification

Knowledge

Essential criteria

• Detailed and advanced knowledge of relevant legislation/ legal frameworks including Mental Health Act, Mental Capacity Act and safeguarding.
• Demonstrates a highly developed understanding of the principles of recovery and the role of secondary mental health services in the delivery of care and able to show how this has been delivered in practice

Desirable criteria

• Knowledge of joint planning and commissioning structures

Experience

Essential criteria

• Substantial post registration experience gained working in front line services
• Experience of providing clinical supervision to colleagues
• Experience of mentoring and assessing students
• Experience of compiling complex written reports
• Significant experience of complex assessment, risk management and care planning in complex need

Skills

Essential criteria

• Teaching and training Skills
• Highly developed communication skills both verbal and written with the ability to engage effectively with people at all levels even when a more assertive approach is needed.
• Excellent IT skills
• Networking skills

We are proud to be fostering a diverse workforce that reflects our communities. A key commitment to this is improving staff representation from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic communities, those from the LGBTQ+ communities, people with 'lived-experience' of mental health conditions and people living with disabilities,- we are a 'Disability Confident Employer' offering a guaranteed interview to Disabled applicants who meet the essential criteria. This includes people with a variety of disabilities and neurodivergent conditions (for example autism, ADHD, sensory, physical and learning disabilities).

We encourage applications from people who wish to work on a flexible basis, recognising that flexibility may mean a range of different working patterns and hours, we do our utmost to work with our staff to meet their needs and the needs of our service users.