Highly Specialist Psychological Therapist

Transformationunitgm; Borough of Swale; On-site; GBP 55,000 - 63,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading NHS trust is seeking a Highly Specialist Psychological Therapist for a unique role at HMP Swaleside. The therapist will provide specialized psychological services to high-risk offenders, focusing on therapeutic interventions and team collaboration. This exciting opportunity requires a dedicated professional with relevant qualifications and experience in complex care settings.

Qualifications

• Entry-level qualification in psychological therapy accepted for professional registration.
• Completion of two years supervised experience post-doctorate.
• Registered with HCPC or equivalent.

Responsibilities

• Provide specialist psychological assessment and therapy to offenders.
• Develop tailored treatment plans in collaboration with multidisciplinary teams.
• Conduct training and supervision of less experienced staff.

Skills

Psychological assessment

Therapeutic interventions

Crisis intervention

Communication skills

Education

Professional Doctorate in psychology

PG Diploma in psychological practice

Job description

Main area Forensic and Prisons Grade Band 8a Contract Permanent Hours Full time - 37.5 hours per week (Monday-Friday, 8am-4pm or 8.30am-4.30pm) Job ref 277-7261837-FOR

Employer Oxleas NHS Foundation Trust Employer type NHS Site HMP Swaleside, Town Eastchurch, Salary £55,755 - £62,504 pa inc Salary period Yearly Closing 30/06/2025 23:59

Highly Specialist Psychological Therapist

Band 8a

Job overview

London Pathways Partnership (LPP) is a consortium of five NHS Trusts delivering services in London and across three prisons as part of the national Offender Personality Disorder (OPD) Pathway programme. The HMP Swaleside Pathways Services are for ‘high risk high harm’ personality disordered offenders from London and the South of the country. The service involves assessment, formulation, psychological and psycho-social interventions, the development of an ‘enabling’ and psychologically-informed environment, and active service user involvement as well as training, case consultation and pathway management. The service operates a psychologically informed planned environment (PIPEs) for men participating in therapeutic activities an Outreach Service, working with highly complex service users on the OPD Pathway as well as a separate therapies service.

Main duties of the job

This is an exciting opportunity for an experienced Psychological Therapist with an interest in personality disorder and/or complex care to take a lead role in the continuing development of the Pathways Services. The service employs a model of ‘joint operations’ and the postholder will work closely with prison colleagues to deliver an integrated service and to develop appropriate pathways through custody and into the community for service users. The post provides opportunities to develop consultation and clinical expertise and experience in the delivery of therapeutic interventions with this complex service user group. The postholder will act as deputy lead in one of the service areas (therapies/PIPE) and will be supported to develop therapeutic skills in one of the core therapies delivered by the services (MBT/Schema/EMDR) under accredited supervision.Due to the nature of the service there are opportunities to do rare and full-filling longer-term therapeutic work.

The post is open to qualified clinical, counselling or forensic psychologists or psychological therapists with strong experience in delivering therapeutic interventions.

Working for our organisation

Oxleas offers a wide range of NHS healthcare services to people in community and secure environment settings. Our services include community health care such as district nursing and speech and language therapy, care for people with learning disabilities and mental health care such as psychiatry, nursing and therapies. Our multidisciplinary teams look after people of all ages and we work in close partnership with other parts of the NHS, local councils and the voluntary sector and through our new provider collaboratives. Our 4,300 members of staff work in many different settings including hospitals, clinics, prisons, secure hospitals, children’s centres, schools and people’s homes.

We have over 125 sites in a variety of locations in the South of England. In London we operate within the Boroughs of Bexley, Bromley Greenwich and into Kent. We manage hospital sites including Queen Mary’s Hospital, Sidcup and Memorial Hospital, Woolwich, as well as the Bracton Centre, our medium secure unit for people with mental health needs. We are the largest NHS provider of prison health services providing healthcare to prisons within Devon, Dorset, Bristol, Wiltshire and Gloucestershire, Kent and South London. We are proud of the care we provide and our people.

Our purpose is to improve lives by providing the best possible care to our patients and their families. This is strengthened by our new values:

• We Listen
• We Care

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

To provide a qualified clinical / forensic psychology service to adult offenders detained within HMP Swaleside. The post holder will provide highly specialist psychological assessment and therapy at the same time as offering advice and consultation on clients’ psychological care to non-psychologist colleagues and to other, non professional carers, working autonomously within professional guidelines and the overall framework of the team’s policies and procedures. To utilise research skills for audit, policy and service development and research within the area served by Oxleas NHS Foundation Trust.

Training and Qualifications

• Entry-level qualification in applied psychological therapy/mental health/social welfare profession or equivalent and demonstrable practice in this field (ie professional Doctorate, or combination of MSc plus PG Diploma level/supervised practice/additional training) that has been accepted for the purposes of professional registration.
• Additional training beyond entry-level qualification in a specialised area of psychological practice (through formal post-qualification training (PG Diploma or equivalent), OR a combination of specialist short courses and/an evidenced portfolio of supervised practice–based learning in a specialist area of clinical psychological therapy practice, assessed by a registered body and/or an experienced clinical supervisor to be of equal level to a Postgraduate Diploma or higher.
• Registered with professional body or regulatory body as appropriate to psychological therapy discipline ie HCPC/UKCP/BACP/BABCP. (A/I) · Evidence of continuing professional development as required by the professional body.

Experience

• Completion of a minimum of two years full-time (or equivalent part-time) post-doctoral / post qualification supervised experience
• Experience of specialist psychological assessment and treatment of clients with the full range of clinical severity under supervision
• Post-qualification of working with and addressing issues of diversity, including experience of working within a multicultural framework.
• Experience of maintaining a high degree of professionalism in the face of highly emotive and distressing problems, verbal abuse and the threat of physical abuse

Knowledge and Skills

• Skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration.
• Ability to administer, score and interpret psychometric and neuropsychological tests with appropriate training and supervision
• Understanding psychological formulation for complex high risk service users.
• 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.
• Knowledge of legislation in relation to the client group, mental health and child protection.
• Evidence of continuing professional development as recommended by the BPS, HCPC or equivalent regulatory body relevant to your profession
• Knowledge of the theory and practice of psychological therapies relevant to the client group.
• Knowledge of the theory and practice of at least two specialised psychological therapies and two assessment methodologies
• Knowledge of current mental health legislation and initiatives and of safeguarding legislation
• Knowledge of the principles and practice of clinical governance, clinical audit and risk management
• Knowledge of equal opportunities, confidentiality and consent issues
• Knowledge of key NHS policies and procedures
• Knowledge of relevant Health & Safety legislation
• Ability to manage severely challenging behaviour/crisis intervention
• Ability to manage unpredictable workloads and frequent demands on concentration and attention
• Report writing and presentation skills
• Competent in Microsoft Office packages
• Ability to manage within available, and sometimes limited, resources

Other

• Ability to teach and train others, using a variety of complex multi-media materials suitable for presentations within public, professional and academic settings.
• Experience of working with diversity, including but not limited to a multicultural framework.
• Ability to identify and employ mechanisms of clinical governance as appropriate, to support and maintain clinical practice in the face of regular exposure to highly emotive material and challenging behaviour.
• Ability to form good working relationships with others in a multi-disciplinary setting.
• Interest and ability to contribute to service development.
• Commitment to Equal Opportunities (

Physical Effort

Light physical effort for several short periods/ sitting in constrained position for extended periods

Mental Effort

Ability to manage unpredictable workloads and frequent demands on concentration and attention skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration

Working Conditions

To face regular exposure to highly emotive material and challenging behaviour

IMPORTANT INFORMATION, PLEASE READ:
All applicants must be willing to undertake National Security Vetting in order to work in a Prison Setting. This will be completed as part of the pre-employment checks through Oxleas and the prison vetting team.

You will need to provide:
Proof of right to work documentation
Proof of ID, needs to include 1 photographic ID
Proof of address documentation
Non-UK passport holders will need to have correct documentation (right to work in the UK) and a Home office Share code.

Address History:
5 years address history will be needed.
Applicants that are not UK Passport holders who provide less than 5 years UK address history will need to provide a Police Certificate which must be in English from where they resided previously.
Applicants who are UK Passport holders who have lived abroad for a period of more than six months during the last three years will need to provide a certificate of good conduct or an overseas police check in English from the countries resided in or visited.

In order to assist you in obtaining a Police Certificate, guidance can be sought from:https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/criminal-records-checks-for-overseas-applicants
If the country you have resided in is not listed here, you can obtain the necessary information by contacting the relevant Embassy or High Commission for that Country. Their contact details can be found on the Foreign & Commonwealth Office website (http://www.fco.gov.uk/en).

Person specification

Qualifications

• Entry-level qualification in applied psychological therapy/mental health/social welfare profession or equivalent and demonstrable practice in this field (ie professional Doctorate, or combination of MSc plus PG Diploma level/supervised practice/additional training) that has been accepted for the purposes of professional registration. (A/I)
• Additional training beyond entry-level qualification in a specialised area of psychological practice (through formal post-qualification training (PG Diploma or equivalent), OR a combination of specialist short courses and/an evidenced portfolio of supervised practice–based learning in a specialist area of clinical psychological therapy practice, assessed by a registered body and/or an experienced clinical supervisor to be of equal level to a Postgraduate Diploma or higher
• Registered with professional body or regulatory body as appropriate to psychological therapy discipline ie HCPC/UKCP/BACP/BABCP. (A/I) Evidence of continuing professional development as required by the professional body
• Training in an evidence based treatment for the client group
• Completed training course in clinical supervision

Experience and Skills

• Understanding of appropriate therapeutic models for complex trauma in offenders
• Completion of a minimum of two years full-time (or equivalent part-time) post-doctoral / post qualification supervised experience
• Experience of specialist psychological assessment and treatment of clients with the full range of clinical severity under supervision
• Post-qualification of working with and addressing issues of diversity, including experience of working within a multicultural framework
• Experience of 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 work or research undertaken in forensic / secure / locked settings
• Experience of providing teaching and training to psychological practitioners or other professional groups

Skills

• Trained in relevant therapeutic modality e.g. MBT, Schema, Trauma-focused work
• Skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration
• Ability to administer, score and interpret psychometric and neuropsychological tests with appropriate training and supervision
• Understanding psychological formulation for complex high risk service users

Employer certification / accreditation badges

You must have appropriate UK professional registration.

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.