Senior Mental Health Practitioner - Eating Disorders Service

Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust; Liverpool; On-site; GBP 46,000 - 53,000; Full time

Job summary

Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust is seeking a Band 7 Mental Health professional for a fixed-term role covering maternity leave. The successful candidate will work across two sites, providing care for young people with eating disorders. This role involves assessments, interventions, and case management in a supportive multidisciplinary team environment. The Trust values diversity and encourages applications from all backgrounds.

Benefits

Flexible working opportunities

Lease car scheme

Home Electronics Scheme

Generous annual leave

Pension scheme

Extensive staff health and well-being programmes

Qualifications

• Experience working with children and young people with eating disorders.
• Training in a therapeutic modality to an accreditable level.

Responsibilities

• Provide assessments and interventions for children and young people.
• Hold full case management responsibility for workload.

Skills

CBT

DBT

SFP

Education

Recognised degree level H&SC qualification

Job description

Main area Mental Health Grade NHS AfC: Band 7 Contract Fixed term: 12 months (Maternity leave cover) Hours

• Full time
• Part time
• Flexible working

37.5 hours per week (Across 2 sites Alder Hey Hospital and Alder Park Crosby) Job ref 411-COM-25-7181941

Employer Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust Employer type NHS Site Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust Town Liverpool Salary £46,148 - £52,809 Per annum Salary period Yearly Closing 28/05/2025 23:59

NHS AfC: Band 7

Alder Hey Children’s NHS Foundation Trust is a provider of specialist health care and has a presence in community outreach sites and, in collaboration with other providers, our clinicians help deliver care closer to patients’ homes by holding local clinics at locations from Cumbria to Shropshire, in Wales and the Isle of Man. The Trust also provides inpatient care for children with complex mental health needs at our Sunflower House building newly relocated, and opened on the hospital site.

We currently have more than 4,000 staff working across our community and hospital sites. We’re also a teaching and training hospital providing education and training to around 540 medical and over 500 nursing and allied health professional students each year.

As black and minority ethnic (BME) employees are currently under-represented in this area, we particularly welcome applications from members of our BME communities. All appointments will be made on merit.

You can expect a warm welcome at Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust, our staff are friendly and welcoming. We listen to each other and work together to embed our Trusts values and behaviours. At Alder Hey we appreciate our staff and reward them with an outstanding benefits package including:

• Great flexible working opportunities
• Lease car scheme and Home Electronics Scheme
• Generous annual leave and pension scheme
• Extensive staff health and well-being programmes

Job overview

This post will work across two sites these are Alder Hey Children's Hospital and the other being the Eating Disorders Day Service Centre which is at Alder Park Crosby.

Mental Health Services at Alder Hey are offering excellent benefit schemes:

Refer a friend – Alder Hey: Successful candidates who are introduced to the trust by existing staff members will receive £1000 after completion of six months in post. Please include the name/Alder Hey email for your friend in the additional information section of your application.This will be paid in two parts, £250 in first month pay on commencement in post, and £750 on completion of six months.

Accommodation: Alder Hey will support the cost of accommodation for up to 3 months from the date of employment (up to £500 per month). The cost is to be paid by the staff member and reclaimed as expenses.

Relocation package: Relocation packages to support new hires and will be consulted on an individual basis, please link in with [e-mail] for further information.

Main duties of the job

This is a full time post for 12 months to cover maternity leave. We are particularly looking for candidates trained in CBT, DBT or SFP.

This is an exciting opportunity for individuals with an interest and experience in working with young people with an eating disorder and/or ARFIDS. The successful applicant will provide a substantial contribution to the clinical work of the team and will hold full case management responsibility for their workload. Regular clinical supervision will be provided.

The main base for this post will be at Alder Hey, but appointments from community bases across Liverpool and Sefton will be required. Experience working with children and young people with an eating disorder will be beneficial. In addition to undertaking assessments and providing intervention and support to children, young people and their families, the post holder will also undertake physical monitoring under the guidance of our Consultant Paediatricians.

The post holders must be able to demonstrate a positive attitude which encompasses our Trust Values of excellence, innovation, openness, respect and together.

If you are enthusiastic and confident with a friendly and outgoing manner, and a focus on providing the best possible service to patients we would like to hear from you.

Working for our organisation

About the team: The Eating Disorder Team (EDYs) provide support and treatment for children and young people in Liverpool and Sefton with an eating disorder and/or ARFIDS, as well as their parents/carers and professionals involved in their care.

This is a multidisciplinary team including Consultant Psychiatrist and Consultant Paediatricians, Clinical Psychology, Family Therapy, CBT and SFP trained staff, Nursing, Support Worker, Assistant Practitioner and Assistant Psychology. The team is based on site at Alder Hey, but offer appointments throughout the community footprint.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

To find out more about the key responsibilities and the specific skills and experience you’ll need, please take a look at the job description and person specification attachments.

Person specification

Q, E & T

• Qualified in core profession -or - recognised degree level H&SC qual with completed KSA
• Training in a therapeutic modality to an accreditable level with registration (where registration is applicable)
• Post qualification in chosen mental health field
• Experience of specialist mental health assessment and therapeutic interventions with children and young people with eating disorders / mental health problems and their families
• Working collaboratively in a multi-disciplinary team
• Experienced in risk assessment
• Working collaboratively with other agencies in a variety of venues
• Must be experienced in providing risk assessment of self harming behaviour
• Must be experienced in analysing presenting problems and able to demonstrate ability to work autonomously utilising a range of therapeutic perspectives and modalities, depending on the needs of the client.
• Must be experienced in and able to demonstrate ability to provide case management supervision for lower banded team members, students and other service group/team professionals as required.
• Must demonstrate ability to be self-reflective and to organise own supervision appropriately. Must be able to demonstrate ability to develop and evaluate consultation and training to other professionals and to staff groups
• Pre-qualification training and qualifications in other fields of child and adolescent mental health, research methodology, staff training
• Experience of working with a wide variety of child mental health problems, across the whole age range, reflecting all levels of clinical severity including maintaining a high degree of professionalism in the face of highly emotive and distressing problems and verbal and physical abuse.
• Experience of teaching, training or supervision
• Experience of the application of specialist mental health assessment and therapeutic interventions in different cultural contexts
• Experience of working with children and young people in a range of clinical settings

K & Skills

• Knowledge of relevant, current legislation.
• Awareness of recent government initiatives
• knowledge of evidence base
• understanding of child development and psychosocial influences
• skilled in the use of complex methods of MH assessment, intervention and management
• able to provide consultation
• able to autonomously manage workload

Personal Attributes

• Enthusiasm for and appreciation of multidisciplinary and multiagency working
• Must demonstrate a professional manner

We reserve the right to close vacancies without notice when we have received a sufficient number of applications from which to make a shortlist. Please ensure you apply without delay if you wish to be considered for this role.

Please ensure you check the email account from which you apply regularly as we will contact you using this regarding your application. All candidates will be notified via email whether or not they have been shortlisted.

Alder Hey Children’s NHS Foundation Trust is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment. We are committed to creating a well-managed, flexible working environment that supports staff and promotes their welfare and development. We actively promote equality and diversity and operate a Zero Tolerance policy to aggression, violence, bullying and harassment.

Should you require any assistance during the application stages please contact recruiting manager of vacancy or the recruitment team at [e-mail] or call 0151 282 4599

Please declare within the supporting information if artificial intelligence (AI) has been used in your application.

Please note, the selection processes at Alder Hey Children's Hospital NHS Foundation Trust are in place to ensure we recruit candidates with the right skills and values, please be advised that the use of AI in applications are monitored. We remain vigilant against candidates who misuse these tools to generate an application that doesn’t accurately reflect their skills.

Employer certification / accreditation badges

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.