CAMHS Liaison Practitioner

Integrated Care System; Portsmouth; On-site; GBP 30,000 - 40,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading healthcare organization in Portsmouth seeks a CAMHS Liaison Practitioner to provide crisis assessments and interventions for children and adolescents in mental health crisis. The role involves collaborating with healthcare professionals and developing support strategies. Ideal candidates will have a background in mental health assessment and treatment and relevant qualifications. Flexible working options are available.

Benefits

Career development opportunities

Inclusive work environment

Flexible working options

Qualifications

• Experience with children and adolescents in mental health settings.
• Ability to conduct specialist mental health assessments.
• Proven track record in crisis intervention.

Responsibilities

• Perform rapid crisis assessments for young people.
• Provide consultation and training for other professionals.
• Develop discharge and follow-up care plans.

Skills

Mental health assessment

Crisis intervention

Communication

Team collaboration

Education

Registered Nurse (RN), Registered Mental Nurse (RMN), Social Work, or Psychology

Professional Qualification at first degree level or equivalent

Post-graduate specialist training

Job description

Go back Hampshire and Isle of Wight Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust

CAMHS Liaison Practitioner

The closing date is 14 August 2025

An exciting opportunity to join the CAMHS Liaison Team at Portsmouth Hospital, as a band 6 CAMHS Liaison Practitioner. The role offers a unique chance to work in a team that champions restorative practice, fosters an inclusive culture, and encourages innovative approaches to supporting young people and families in crisis within an acute hospital setting. You'll have the opportunity to contribute to and shape new initiatives that make a real difference.

The CAMHS Liaison Service is an acute mental health crisis assessment service, based at QA hospital. It offers the following:

Assessment of children and young people who have presented at QA Hospital with acute mental health concerns such as self-harm, overdose and suicidal ideation

Liaising and building positive relationships with hospital staff and wider network services such as social care and schools

Supervision and training for staff at QA hospital

Consultation and advice for staff at QA hospital and partner agencies

Safe discharge and follow up plan from QA Hospital

Main duties of the job

*Undertaking rapid crisis assessments for young people referred through the general hospitals and community referral pathway, providing short crisis intervention and signpost to other specialist services as required.

*Based on the assessment, to formulate and convey sensitive, complex, and sometimes unwelcome information to clients and other professionals and manage this as constructively as possible.

*To work as a senior practitioner providing clinically effective and therapeutic interventions for children, adolescents and their families considering the complexities of mental health problems. This requires an awareness of the potential impact of wider systems on individuals and families, requiring intense concentration over prolonged periods on a daily basis.

*To be able to assess and provide the appropriate format of intervention such as: individual, family or group work.

*Continually delivering and maintaining high standards of service provision that is evidence based and in line with recognised best practice.

*Participating and leading in joint complex assessments with other disciplines and other agencies as required.

*To provide consultation, specialist advice and training to professionals who come into contact and who have an important influence with children and young people who have mental health needs.

About us

Hampshire and Isle of Wight Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust is a newly established organisation, bringing together expertise from across mental health, learning disabilities, community, and physical health services. We are dedicated to delivering compassionate, high-quality, and accessible care to the diverse communities of Hampshire and the Isle of Wight.

With over 13,000 dedicated staff working across more than 300 sites, we place patients and staff at the centre of everything we do. Our goal is to create an integrated healthcare system that improves accessibility and ensures more consistent care for patients. By working together, we aim to improve patient outcomes, drive innovation, and meet the unique needs of the populations we serve.

Our Trust unites services from Southern Health, Solent NHS Trust, Isle of Wight NHS Trusts community and mental health teams, as well as Hampshire CAMHS, originally part of Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust. This transformation enables us to deliver more seamless care across the region, ensuring that patients receive the right support, in the right place, at the right time.

Join us as we embark on this exciting journey to shape the future of healthcare across Hampshire and the Isle of Wight. We are deeply committed to our CARE values of compassion, accountability, respect, and excellence, and offer outstanding opportunities for career development, training, and collaborative working.

Job responsibilities

Further information about the Trust and this role can be found on the Job Description and Person Specification document attached. It is important to us that we ensure our recruitment processes are accessible and inclusive to everyone - if as a potential candidate you are concerned a person specification may prevent or restrict your application for employment as a result of unintentional barriers on the grounds of your sex, race, age, sexual orientation, religion/belief or disability please initially contact the Trust's Recruitment team - detailed in the advert. The Trust will seek to resolve this issue wherever possible.

We are happy to talk Flexible Working - all requests for flexible working options can be discussed as part of the interview process.

Person Specification

Qualifications

• Nationally recognised core qualification i.e. RN,RMN, Social work, Psychology
• Professional Qualification at first degree level or equivalent
• Completion of further post-qualification specialist training at post graduate level

Experience

• Experience of specialist mental health assessment and treatment of children and adolescents and their families/carers where appropriate as a full member of a multi-disciplinary team located in community, primary care, outpatients, or inpatient settings.
• Experience of working with a wide variety of children, adolescents and their families/carers across the whole range and presenting problems that reflect the full range of clinical severity.
• Post qualifying experience of working as a specialist mental health worker within a mental health setting.
• Experience of teaching and or training other professionals.

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.

Employer name

Hampshire and Isle of Wight Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust