Locum Consultant in Liaison Psychiatry

Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust; Leeds; On-site; GBP 105,000 - 140,000; Full time

Job summary

Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust seeks a Consultant psychiatrist for the Hospital Mental Health Team, focusing on liaison psychiatry. This role involves providing medical leadership and expertise, assessing patients referred from general hospital wards, and working within a multi-disciplinary team. The position offers a competitive salary and various employee benefits, including flexible working arrangements.

Benefits

27 - 33 days annual leave

Flexible working arrangements

NHS Pension Scheme

Career development opportunities

Employee wellbeing support

Qualifications

• GMC specialist register for psychiatry required.
• At least one year experience in liaison psychiatry.
• Ability to provide medical leadership within a multi-disciplinary team.

Responsibilities

• Ensure patients referred from general hospital wards are assessed appropriately.
• Provide medical expertise and leadership within the multi-disciplinary team.
• Conduct direct assessments for complex cases.

Skills

Empathy

Integrity

Leadership

Education

Completion of formal training programme in General Adult Psychiatry

Approved Clinician status as defined within the Mental Health Act

Endorsement in liaison psychiatry

Job description

Are you looking for mental health jobs in Leeds, York or with one of our regional services operating across the country? We have a range of NHS Job opportunities, placements and specialities in our clinical, research, and professional support teams across Leeds and York.

At Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (LYPFT), we strive to provide high-quality mental health and learning disability services as an employer of choice. We can only achieve this by putting our staff and the people using our services at the centre of everything we do. This starts with the people we employ. We recruit based on values and qualifications (where required) and believe lived experience is an advantage. We look for potential, not perfection, and this means that together, we are as diverse as the communities we care for.

Simply put, we seek out people who care, act with integrity and have the right skills. We want to add to our incredible colleagues, students and volunteers who share these principles, with people like you, who find empathy comes easily and who treat everyone with respect without thinking. Search our latest jobs to start your journey with us.

Main area Hospital Mental Health Team (Working Age Adult) Grade Consultant Contract Fixed term: 6 months (Locum position) Hours Full time - 40 hours per week Job ref 173-28025-MED

Site The Becklin Centre Town Leeds Salary £105,504 - £139,882 Per Annum Salary period Yearly Closing 28/05/2025 23:59

All references should be directed through the Employers HR Department wherever possible to comply with NHS Check Standards. Please ensure that a HR address/email is provided for each referee named.

Job overview

The Trust is seeking a Consultant psychiatrist in the Hospital Mental Health Team for working age adults at St James University Hospital. This vacancy is 10 PA trust locum post in Liaison Psychiatry based at the Becklin Centre from 4 th August 2025 until 3 rd February 2026, with the potential for a 3 to 6 month extension. You will work as part of a multi-disciplinary team providing input to the Leeds Teaching Hospital NHS Trust at St James University Hospital.

Main duties of the job

To work with the Hospital Mental Health Team to ensure that patients referred from general hospital wards to the liaison psychiatry team are assessed and managed appropriately and to provide medical expertise and medical leadership within a multi-disciplinary team.

Working for our organisation

The Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (LYPFT) is the main provider of Mental Health and Learning Disability services in Leeds. We also provide specialist inpatient services in York and some highly specialised services across the country. As a teaching trust with strong links to local universities, we are a centre of excellence for teaching, research and development.

There are many benefits of working for LYPFT including fantastic employee wellbeing support, 27 - 33 days annual leave, flexible working and remote working arrangements, the NHS Pension Scheme, coaching, support and opportunities for career development and training and education support alongside a range of exclusive discounts and payment schemes including for cars, extra leave days and more NHS Discount Offers.

We also have an incredible bank department, offering variety of roles in nursing, allied health professions, healthcare support worker and administration clerical. Permanent employees are automatically added to bank.

Applicants should be aware that any individual requiring a visa to work in the UK, the Trust provides sponsorship for registered healthcare practitioner roles only (this does not include Healthcare Support Workers). This is an essential requirement, and the Trust is unable to offer you a role if you do not meet Trust requirements for sponsorship and Home Office requirements for a visa.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

This is a consultant liaison psychiatrist post. Clinically, the postholder will work with the Hospital Mental Health Team (HMHT) and provide medical leadership and medical expertise to the MDT and ensure that patients referred from general hospital wards are assessed and managed appropriately. This is an opportunity to work in one of the most comprehensive Liaison Psychiatry services in the country alongside several other Liaison Psychiatrists.

The HMHT receives between 3 to 4 referrals each day from the general hospital wards. A team meeting is held each morning so that the referrals can be managed and allocated effectively. The consultants normally lead in allocating new assessments and follow up reviews between themselves and the rest of the team. Referrals are prioritised at the point of referral and those that are deemed to be urgent, have to be discussed with one of the liaison consultants. The post holder will be expected to provide direct assessments for complex cases as well as supervision to other team members as required, this will typically equate to the postholder undertaking 2 to 3 new patient assessments and 4 to 6 follow up/review assessments per week. The postholder would not be expected to carry a caseload.

Person specification

Qualifications & Experience

• Completion of formal training programme in General Adult Psychiatry, on GMC specialist register for psychiatry
• To be approved under s12 of the MHA 1983 and hold Approved Clinician status as defined within the Mental Health Act by commencement of post
• Endorsement in liaison psychiatry seen on GMC register, or at least one year experience of liaison psychiatry in training or non training role

Applications are welcomed from candidates who wish to apply for a position based on a smarter (Hybrid) or flexible working arrangement – please contact the Recruitment Team if you have any queries regarding this in terms of your initial application. Where candidates are successful at interview, flexible working arrangement requests will be taken into consideration and may be accommodated where the needs of the service allow.

Fixed Term Contracts for existing NHS Employees – temporary contracts for employees of LYPFT, or colleagues joining from another NHS Trust, will be offered on a secondment basis wherever possible. In the event this is not possible, an FTC would be issued and this would require a break in service of two weeks.

The purpose of a temporary is role could be for maternity cover, temporary funding or some other reason. At the end of which the need for the temporary work will cease. Temporary roles can stop, be extended and/or made permanent at any point during the period of work. Should the role become permanent then the post-holder will be informed of the process to be followed to convert the position to a permanent one.

Please note that from 1st July 2018, all new employees are required to subscribe to the DBS Update Service, DBS checks for volunteers remain free of charge.

Patient Safety is a priority at LYPFT with a focus on system-based improvement and creating opportunities for learning. We will ensure compassionate engagement with all those involved in an incident and all incidents are met with a proportionate response. LYPFT is committed to upholding its’ statutory responsibilities in relation to safeguarding adults and children. Please refer to job description for further information.

LYPFT is a member of the Disability Confident scheme and is committed to providing a fully inclusive and accessible recruitment process.

As part of the Trust's commitment to its Gold Standard Armed Forces Covenant status, members of the Armed Forces Community are entitled to a guaranteed interview subject to meeting the role criteria.

We welcome applicants with lived experience of providing unpaid care and/or support to a family member or friend with a disability, health condition, frailty, mental health problem, addiction or other health needs.

Please note that the Trust reserves the right to close the vacancy before the closing date if enough applications are received. It is in the candidate’s best interest to apply as soon as possible. In submitting an application form, you authorise Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust to confirm any previous NHS service details via the ESR IAT process should you be appointed to the post.

In applying for a role please ensure that you only declare qualifications that are relevant to the role itself. We reserve the right to check all declared qualifications on an application form, whether they are directly relevant to the role or not.

If you have not received any communication from us within four weeks you are asked to assume that your application has been unsuccessful. If you should have any queries regarding progress with your application form please contact us.

Please note: The Trust does not offer reimbursement of interview expenses.

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.

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