Highly Specialist Clinical Psychologist

NHS; Cambridge; On-site; GBP 53,000 - 61,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading NHS organization is seeking a highly specialist Clinical Psychologist with a focus on neuropsychology to join their dynamic Cambridge Centre for Paediatric Neuropsychological Rehabilitation. The role involves assessing and treating children with acquired brain injuries, working as part of an interdisciplinary team to deliver innovative rehabilitation services. Candidates should have doctoral training, HCPC registration, and expertise in psychological assessments and interventions.

Qualifications

• Doctoral level training in Clinical, Educational or Counselling psychology required.
• HCPC Registration essential.
• Specific training in psychopathology and neuropsychology with therapy models.

Responsibilities

• Provide highly specialist neuropsychological assessments to children with brain injury.
• Work with interdisciplinary teams to formulate and deliver goal-based rehabilitation.
• Support Clinical Lead in service management and development.

Skills

Psychological assessment

Formulation

Intervention

Communication

Clinical governance

Education

Doctoral level training in Clinical Psychology

HCPC Registered

Training in supervision of trainee clinical psychologists

Specialised training in neuropsychology

Job description

Go back Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust

Highly Specialist Clinical Psychologist

The closing date is 02 June 2025

This is an exciting opportunity for a Clinical Psychologist, with a specialist interest in neuropsychology, to join the Cambridge Centre for Paediatric Neuropsychological Rehabilitation (CCPNR).

This 12-month fixed term/secondment contract offers an opportunity to contribute to this pioneering service, offering specialist holistic neuropsychological rehabilitation to children and adolescents with acquired brain injury, across the East of England. The post holder will have expertise in assessment and intervention with children and young people with acquired brain injury and working interdisciplinarity.

As a member of a 10 strong interdisciplinary service, you will be senior member of the team with the skills and specialist knowledge to support the needs of children and young people with non-progressive acquired brain injury. Their needs may be complex with a range of interacting cognitive, social, emotional and physical difficulties.

The CCPNR is a specialist community service for children with non-progressive acquired brain injuries in the East of England. It is a dynamic, innovative service provided by CPFT that has an international reputation for delivery of integrated, multidisciplinary neuro-rehabilitation for children. CCPNR is part of the Psychological Medicine for Children and Families service which is well established at Addenbrookes Hospital.

Main duties of the job

To provide a qualified, highly specialist psychology service to children and adolescents with a brain injury and their families.

To work collaboratively with interdisciplinary colleagues to formulate young people's presenting needs and provide multi systemic interventions at home and at school in the delivery of goal based rehabilitation. To work autonomously within professional guidelines and the overall framework of both the Trust's and the CCPNR's policies and procedures.

To utilise research skills for audit, policy and service development and research within childhood ABI. To support the Clinical Lead with the everyday management of the service.

About us

As an interdisciplinary team, we work very closely together with children and families. We have a positive work culture and engage in activities to support wellbeing.

The CCPNR is at Brookside, Trumpington Road, Cambridge. We share close links with the Paediatric Psychological Medicine Department at Addenbrookes Hospital.

Cambridgeshire & Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust is a health & social care organisation dedicated to providing high quality care with compassion to improve the health & wellbeing of the people we care for, as well as supporting & empowering them to lead a fulfilling life.

To achieve our goal, we look to recruit high calibre candidates that share our vision & values. As an equal opportunities employer, we encourage applications from all sectors of the community, particularly from under-represented groups including disabled people & members of our ethnic minorities & LGBTQ+ communities

Regrettably, we cannot offer sponsorship for all our job roles. If you apply for a role that we cannot offer sponsorship for, unfortunately, your application form will be rejected from the process.

For further information on CPFT, please visit our website at www.cpft.nhs.uk

Job responsibilities

Please refer to the attached job description and person specification for full details of responsibilities

To provide highly specialist paediatric neuropsychological assessments of children/young people referred to the Service, based upon the appropriate use, interpretation and integration of complex data from a variety of sources including psychological and neuropsychological tests, self-report measures, rating scales, direct and indirect structured observations and semi-structured interviews with clients, parents/carers, teachers, family members and others involved in the clients care.

To develop neuropsychological formulations of presenting problems or situations that integrate information from assessments within a coherent framework that draws upon psychological theory and evidence, which incorporates anatomical, physiological and developmental perspectives.

To develop and implement plans for the formal psychological treatment and/or management of a clients cognitive, social, behavioural and emotional difficulties, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the clients problems, and employing methods based upon evidence of efficacy, across the full range of care settings

To be responsible for implementing a range of psychological interventions for children/young people, their parents/carers, families and groups, within the Service, adjusting and refining psychological formulations by drawing upon different explanatory models and maintaining a number of provisional hypotheses.

To evaluate and make decisions about treatment options taking into account theoretical and therapeutic models and the highly complex and integrative factors associated with the acquired brain injury and developmental processes. To maintain an awareness of other historical factors, which may have shaped the child/young person, his/her parents/carers and the family.

To provide highly specialist paediatric neuropsychological 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 for the benefit of all children/young people referred to 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 in line with Trust and inter-agency policies and procedures.

To act as care coordinator, ensuring the provision of a care package appropriate for the clients needs, coordinating the work of others involved with care, tasking responsibility for arranging reviews as required and communicating effectively with the client, his/her family and all others involved in the network of care and to monitor progress during the course of interdisciplinary interventions.

To communicate, in a highly skilled and sensitive manner, to clients, parents/carers, family and others as appropriate, information that may be contentious or highly distressing concerning the assessment, formulation and prognosis of clients under their care.

The team is constantly developing through research, audit and service user collaborations. As such we are looking to recruit an experienced clinical psychologist who has an interest in service development. The post holder will support the Clinical Lead in the day to day management of the team and implementation of new processes and policies. This will include rostering, leave, allocations, and liaison with Integrated Care Boards about new referrals.

Person Specification

Education / Qualifications

• Doctoral level training in Clinical, Educational or Counselling psychology
• HCPC Registered
• Undertaken training in the supervision of trainee clinical psychologists.
• Specific training in models of psychopathology, clinical psychometrics and neuropsychology, two or more distinct psychological therapies and lifespan developmental psychology as accredited by the HCPC.

Experience

• Experience of specialist psychological assessment, formulation and treatment of clients across the full range of care settings, including outpatient, community, primary care and in-patient settings.
• Experience of working with a wide variety of client groups, across the whole life course presenting problems that reflect the full range of clinical severity, maintaining a high degree of professionalism in the face of highly emotive and distressing problems, verbal abuse and the threat of physical abuse.
• Experience of exercising full clinical responsibility for client's psychological care and treatment, both as a professionally qualified clinician and also within the context of a multidisciplinary care-plan.
• Demonstrate further specialist training/experience.
• Experience of working with children with a learning disability.
• Experience of working with people with an autistic spectrum disorder.
• Experience of the application of clinical psychology in different social and cultural contexts.

Skills & Abilities

• Able to demonstrate commitment to high quality care and service provision.
• Excellent clinical skills of psychological assessment, formulation, intervention and evaluation frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration. This requires the use of highly developed analytical and judgement skills.
• Well-developed skills in the ability to communicate effectively, orally and in writing, complex, highly technical and/or clinically sensitive information, including contentious and potentially highly distressing information, to clients, their families, carers and other professional colleagues both within and outside the NHS.
• Skills in individual and group work and in programme planning.
• Ability to identify and employ mechanisms of clinical governance, including regular supervision, to support and maintain clinical practice in the face of regular exposure to highly emotive material and challenging behaviour.
• Knowledge of legislation in relation to the client group and its implications for both clinical practice and professional management in relation to the client group.
• Doctorate level knowledge of research methodology, research design and complex, multivariate data analysis as practiced within the clinical fields of psychology.
• Highly developed knowledge of lifespan developmental psychology and models of psychopathology and learning relevant to children and young people.
• oKnowledge of the theory and practice of specialised psychological therapies in child and adolescent/ children with learning disability.
• oHigh level knowledge of the theory and practice of at least two specialised psychological therapies.

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.

Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust

£53,755 to £60,504 a yearper annum pro rata