Practitioner Psychologist

North West Borough Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust; St Helens; On-site; GBP 42,000 - 62,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Flexible working

Job summary

Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust is seeking a Clinical Psychologist to work across acute inpatient wards in St Helens. The role involves direct clinical service to adults, 1:1 assessments, group work and consultancy within the inpatient psychology service.

Band 7 or 8a with progression potential; preceptorship for Band 7 and CPD support provided. Flexible working options may be considered to balance service needs.

Qualifications

• Doctoral level training in Clinical/Counselling/Health psychology and HCPC registration.
• Experience with specialist psychological assessment, formulation and therapy.
• Experience teaching, training and supervision of staff and trainees.
• Knowledge of IT systems and clinical documentation.

Responsibilities

• Provide specialist psychological assessment, formulation and intervention for adults on inpatient wards.
• Lead groups, provide 1:1 therapies and regular reflective practice.
• Offer consultancy and training to multidisciplinary staff and supervise assistants.
• Contribute to service development, guidelines and trauma-informed care on the wards.
• Support ongoing professional development and supervise trainee psychologists.

Skills

Complex psychological assessment

Communication skills

Consultation

Teaching and training

Education

Doctoral level training in Clinical/Counselling/Health psychology

Job description

Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust celebrates diversity and promotes equal opportunities; we are committed to challenging and eliminating racism and other forms of discrimination and advancing and promoting equality of opportunity in the provision of services and creating an inclusive environment for all employees. We believe that everyone has the right to be treated with dignity and respect. We take positive action to support disadvantaged groups and also particularly encourage applications from ethnically diverse, disabled and LGBTQIA+ people that are under-represented in our workforce. Furthermore we welcome applications from reservists and ex-armed forces personnel as we recognise the benefits of the values, skills, training and experience that they bring to their work with us. We encourage all applicants to share their equality information with us.

Using AI to support your application

AI can be a useful tool to support the preparation of your application. However, all information submitted must be accurate, truthful and reflect your own skills, experience and achievements. Applications should include personal examples demonstrating how you meet the person specification. Applications that appear mostly or fully generated by AI, without clear personal examples linked to the person specification, may be rejected. For tips and guidance, please refer to our applicant guidance.

Identity verification

Candidates attending interview will be required to provide original photographic identification where available. Where suitable photographic identification is not available, a photograph will be taken at interview for identity verification purposes. Successful candidates will also be required to complete digital identity and right to work checks via TrustID, including facial recognition and image matching technology, to verify their identity throughout the recruitment and onboarding process. Identity verification will also be undertaken on the first day of employment in line with NHS employment check requirements.

Job overview

An exciting opportunity has arisen for a Clinical Psychologist or Practitioner Psychologist to join our Inpatient Psychology service working across Acute Inpatient Mental Health Wards in Mid Mersey. The post will be full time across two adult acute inpatient ward at Peasley Cross, St Helens. The wards are Taylor Ward (Male) and Iris Ward (Female). Both teams are welcoming of psychology and valuing psychological ways of working.

You will provide a direct clinical service to adults on the wards, will oversee psychology groups and offer 1:1 assessments and brief psychological interventions. You will provide consultancy, training and advice to other clinical staff and offer regular reflective practice. This is a great opportunity to join a network of established inpatient psychologists, and assistant psychologists. You will receive regular supervision and CPD as well as informal support.

Developing clinical guidelines, pathways and processes will also be integral to this role, helping to hold the psychological framework and trauma informed care in mind with ward teams.

Applicants at Band 7 or Band 8a level are eligible to apply. Applicants joining at Band 7 will have the opportunity to engage in a preceptorship programme with the opportunity to progress to Band 8a once required competencies have been met.

Main duties of the job

Successful applicants would be working within teams to support people with a range of psychological issues. The applicant will provide specialist psychological assessment, therapy and interventions to service users and carers, making use of a range of models where appropriate.

Successful applicants would also offer specialist advice, leadership and consultation to non-psychologist colleagues and support the development of psychological skills across the whole workforce through specialist training, supervision, mentorship and reflective practice. Psychological input is highly valued by staff within the service. You will work alongside the senior Clinical Psychologist to be involved in ongoing service development and in shaping service innovations.

We have excellent links with North West doctoral training programmes and offer placements to trainees from local universities on a regular basis and the post holder would be expected to clinically supervise and manage the workloads of assistant psychologists and trainee clinical psychologists within the service as required.

You will contribute towards the continuing professional development, training, research, advising and supporting the Multi-disciplinary team as appropriate.

Working for our organisation

Mersey Care is one of the largest trusts providing physical health and mental health services in the North West, serving more than 1.4 million people across our region and are also commissioned for services that cover the North West, North Wales and the Midlands.

We offer specialist inpatient and community services that support physical and mental health and specialist inpatient mental health, learning disability, addiction and brain injury services. Mersey Care is one of only three trusts in the UK that offer high secure mental health facilities.

At the heart of all we do is our commitment to 'perfect care' - care that is safe, effective, positively experienced, timely, equitable and efficient. We support our staff to do the best job they can and work alongside service users, their families, and carers to design and develop future services together. We're currently delivering a programme of organisational and service transformation to significantly improve the quality of the services we provide and safely reduce cost as we do so.

Flexible working requests will be considered for all roles.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

The post holder will be responsible for undertaking psychological work with service users. Main duties include: assessment, formulation, intervention, attending ward meetings, audits and service evaluations, and provide regular reflective practice to both ward teams. You will work closely with two assistant psychologist to support the delivery of individual and group psychological interventions. Strong emphasis is placed on supporting the wider workforce, enhancing their understanding of and support for psychologically informed ways of working, and promoting formulation based understanding and approaches. Of primary importance is an interest and commitment to working with individuals with complex mental health needs. You will be committed to improving the quality of life of people with complex mental health problems and you will support the ward teams system to deliver models of care. The post holder will report directly to the Consultant Clinical Psychologist.

Please refer to the Job Description and Person Specification for further details.

Person specification

Qualifications

Essential criteria

• Doctoral level training in Clinical/Counselling/Health psychology, or its approved equivalent accredited by the BPS, allowing registration with the HCPC as a Practitioner Psychologist

Desirable criteria

• Pre-qualification training and qualifications in research methodology, staff training and/or other fields of applied psychology

Experience

Essential criteria

• 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 including 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 teaching, training and/or supervision
• Experience of the application of psychology in different cultural contexts

Desirable criteria

• Pre-qualification training and qualifications in research methodology, staff training and/or other fields of applied psychology

Knowledge

Essential criteria

• Doctoral level knowledge of research methodology, research design and complex, multivariate data analysis as practiced within the clinical fields of psychology
• Knowledge of legislation in relation to the client group and mental health
• Knowledge of IT systems including word processing, email and local electronic patient information systems

Desirable criteria

• Knowledge of the theory and practice of specialised psychological therapies in specific difficult to treat groups (e.g. personality disorder, dual diagnoses, people with additional disabilities etc
• Knowledge of the theory and practice of at least one specialised psychological therapy

Skills

Essential criteria

• Expertise in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, formulation, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration
• Well developed and effective communication skills, oral and written, to communicate complex, highly technical and/or clinically sensitive information to clients, their families, carers and other professional colleagues both within and outside the NHS
• Skills in providing consultation to other professional and nonprofessional groups
• Ability to teach and train others, using a variety of complex multi-media materials suitable for presentations within public, professional and academic settings
• Reasonable adjustments will be made for those with sensory impairment
• Ability to identify and employ mechanisms of service governance as appropriate, to support and maintain clinical practice in the face of regular exposure to highly emotive material and challenging behaviour
• Ability to self-reflect, use clinical supervision appropriately and consider complex organisational and team dynamics