Mental Health Practitioner

Oxleas NHS Foundation Trust; Sidcup; On-site; GBP 42,000 - 54,000; Full time

Job summary

Oxleas NHS Foundation Trust is recruiting a Band 6 clinician to join the Home Treatment Team based at Hawthorns in Bexley. The post provides clinical input to a multidisciplinary team seven days a week to offer an effective alternative to admission and to support safe discharge and 72 Hour follow-up from inpatient units.

The post holder will lead complex assessments, exercise clinical autonomy, contribute to risk management, and support junior staff while delivering recovery-focused care in

Qualifications

• Senior mental health practitioner with registration qualified and eligible to practice
• Experience leading teams and supervising junior staff
• Ability to assess risk and make robust clinical decisions under pressure
• Knowledge of Mental Health Act, MCA, and safeguarding

Responsibilities

• Provides clinical leadership, supports junior staff, and ensures safe, recovery-focused care.
• Leads and coordinates teams during challenging situations, manages workload and referrals.
• Conducts comprehensive mental health assessments, risk assessments, and develops care plans.
• Promotes safeguarding, documentation, and inter-agency co-ordination.

Skills

Mental health assessment

Risk assessment

Clinical leadership

De-escalation

Autonomy

Job description

An exciting opportunity has arisen to join Oxleas NHS Foundation Trust as a valued Band 6 clinician based at Hawthorns providing clinical input into the Home Treatment Team in Bexley.

Home Treatment Team is a multidisciplinary team, providing a service seven days a week, 365 days per year to individuals in mental health crisis with the principal aim of providing an effective alternative to inpatient care. This involves intensive clinical work over short periods of time to prevent the need for admission or facilitate safe early discharge. The team also carries out 72 Hour follow-up for individuals discharged from mental health inpatient units.

As a senior clinician, the post holder will play a key role in the gatekeeping of acute inpatient admissions, undertaking complex assessments to determine whether individuals can be safely and effectively treated in their own homes. This requires a high degree of clinical autonomy, advanced risk formulation skills, and the ability to make robust, evidence-based decisions under pressure.

Main duties of the job

• An experienced mental health practitioner who provides clinical leadership, supports and mentors junior staff, and ensures safe, high-quality, recovery-focused care. Demonstrates extensive knowledge of the Mental Health Act, Mental Capacity Act, Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards, and other relevant legislation, ensuring compliance and supporting colleagues to apply legal frameworks in practice.
• Leads and coordinates teams during challenging situations, using effective risk management, de-escalation techniques, and post-incident debriefing to promote safety and learning. Acts as Shift Coordinator when required, managing workload, prioritising referrals, coordinating resources, and supporting operational service delivery.
• Clinically skilled in conducting comprehensive mental health assessments, MSE, risk assessments, and developing robust risk management and care plans. Works autonomously and collaboratively with service users, carers, multidisciplinary teams, and partner agencies to deliver person-centred care. Competent in medication management, physical health monitoring, health promotion, recovery-focused interventions, and safeguarding patient dignity, equality, and rights.
• Committed to developing others through supervision, teaching, mentorship, and constructive feedback while promoting evidence-based practice, professional accountability, and continuous service improvement.

About us

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're Kind
• We Listen
• We Care

Job responsibilities

Demonstrates excellent communication skills, providing clear, accurate, and timely information to patients, carers, families, colleagues, and partner agencies. Communicates effectively using active listening, professional judgement, and appropriate communication methods tailored to individual needs, cultural differences, and complex situations.

Maintains high standards of clinical documentation, ensuring accurate verbal and written handovers, comprehensive patient records, and timely use of care plans, pathways, and electronic systems. Able to identify and communicate key clinical information, recognise deterioration in a patient's mental or physical health, and escalate concerns appropriately and without delay.

Effectively manages patient caseloads by coordinating care, prioritising workload, delegating tasks according to staff competence, and identifying and mitigating risks. Works collaboratively with multidisciplinary teams to ensure continuity of care and promptly communicates significant changes in a patient's condition.

Demonstrates a strong understanding of risk management, safeguarding, and confidentiality, ensuring adherence to Trust policies and procedures. Supports junior staff in recognising and responding to safeguarding concerns, promoting the welfare of children, young people, and vulnerable adults while maintaining patient safety, dignity, and confidentiality at all times.

Person Specification

REgistration

• Qualifed with registration
• OT/RMN/SW

Qualification

• Qualification
• Achieved Grade and years of experience

HTT/Community Experience

• HTT/Community Experience
• Experience working in HTT or Community Mental Health team

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.