SPLW - Children & Young People Support

NHS; Billingham; On-site; GBP 25,000 - 35,000; Full time

Job summary

A local primary care network in Billingham is seeking a passionate individual to support children and young adults through social prescribing. The role involves providing personalized support, building trusting relationships, and connecting patients to essential community services. The ideal candidate will have experience in primary care, a driving license, and be dedicated to enhancing the wellbeing of young patients. This rewarding position promotes community engagement and aims to reduce health inequalities.

Qualifications

• Experience of working in primary care.
• Experience of working in a GP practice.
• Driving licence.

Responsibilities

• Provide personalised support to individuals and their families.
• Develop trusting relationships with patients.
• Manage and prioritise own caseload as needed.
• Promote social prescribing within the community.
• Communicate with community groups and agencies.

Job description

Go back Billingham and Norton Primary Care Network

SPLW - Children & Young People Support

The closing date is 12 December 2025

Social prescribing is a role created to assist in empowering individuals to take control of their own health and wellbeing. Social Prescribers focus on the individual and take a holistic approach by connecting patients to community groups and statutory services for practical and emotional support. This role will be supporting young patients within the community. This person will be passionate about working children and young adults with a variety of needs, from someone who is struggling with exam anxiety to potentially complex family cases. An exciting and varied role will give real job satisfaction!

Social prescribing can help to strengthen community and personal resilience, reduces health inequalities by addressing the wider determinants of health, such as debt, poor housing and physical inactivity, by increasing peoples active involvement with their local communities. Being part of the Personalised Care Service with provide to our PCNs will give you to opportunity to support patients in a truly rewarding way.

Main duties of the job

Working with GP practices within their primary care networks you will be responsible for incoming referrals from a wide range of agencies as well as your own primary care network. (list not exhaustive).

Provide personalised support to individuals and their families enabling them to take control of their wellbeing, live independently and improve their health outcomes.

Develop trusting relationships by giving people time and focus on what matters to me. Take a holistic approach, based on the persons priorities and the wider determinants of health.

Co-produce in consultation with the patient and when appropriate other multi-disciplinary teams personalised support plans created to improve health and wellbeing, introducing or reconnecting people to community groups and statutory services.

The role will require managing and prioritising your own caseload, in accordance with the needs, priorities and any urgent support required by the individual It is therefore vital that you have a strong awareness and understanding of when it is appropriate or necessary to refer people back to other health professionals/agencies, when what the individuals needs is beyond the scope of your role.

About us

Our mission in Billingham & Norton is to strengthen,develop and support local general practice, to enable the delivery of high-quality care to local people.

Our PCN is a network of seven practices with a combined listsize of over 51,000 patients. We work collaboratively across all of our practices and have a strong working relationship with our GP Federation.

Job responsibilities

Promoting the Billingham & Norton PCN personalised care service to all stakeholders you come into contact with i.e Practices or Community Services.

Promoting social prescribing its role in self-management, and the wider determinants of health.

Build relationships with key staff in GP practices and within the Primary Care Networks (PCN), attending relevant meetings, becoming part of the wider network team, giving information and feedback on social prescribing.

Be proactive in developing strong links with all local agencies, encouraging referrals, recognising what they need to be confident in the service to make appropriate referrals.

Work in partnership with all local agencies to raise awareness of social prescribing and how partnership working can reduce pressure on statutory services, improve health outcomes and enable a holistic approach to care.

Provide referral agencies with regular updates about social prescribing, including training for their staff and how to access information to encourage appropriate referrals.

Seek and create reports on regular feedback about the quality of service and impact of social prescribing on referral agencies.

Be proactive in encouraging self-referrals and connecting with all local communities, particularly those communities that statutory agencies may find hard to reach.

Meet people on a one-to-one basis, making home visits where appropriate within organisations policies and procedures. Give people time to tell their stories and focus on what matters to me. Build trust with the person, providing non-judgemental support, respecting diversity and lifestyle choices. Work from a strength-based approach focusing on a persons assets.

Be a friendly source of information about wellbeing and prevention approaches.

Help people identify the wider issues that impact on their health and wellbeing, such as debt, poor housing, being unemployed, loneliness and caring responsibilities.

Work with the person, their families and carers and consider how they can all be supported through social prescribing.

Help people maintain or regain independence through living skills, adaptations, enablement approaches and simple safeguards.

Work with individuals to co-produce a simple personalised support plan based on the persons priorities, interests, values and motivations including what they can expect from the groups, activities and services they are being connected to and what the person can do for themselves to improve their health and wellbeing.

Where appropriate, physically introduce people to community groups, activities and statutory services, ensuring they are comfortable. Follow up to ensure they are happy, able to engage, included and receiving good support.

Where people may be eligible for a personal health budget, help them to explore this option as a way of providing funded, personalised support to be independent, including helping people to gain skills for meaningful employment, where appropriate. Support community groups and VCSE organisations to receive referrals

Forge strong links with local organisations, community and neighbourhood level groups, utilising their networks and building on what is already available to create a map or menu of community groups and assets. Use these opportunities to promote micro-commissioning or small grants if available.

Develop supportive relationships with local VCSE organisations, community groups and statutory services, to make timely, appropriate and supported referrals for the person being introduced.

Ensure that local community groups and VCSE organisations being referred to have basic procedures in place for ensuring that vulnerable individuals are safe and, where there are safeguarding concerns, work with all partners to deal appropriately with issues. Where such policies and procedures are not in place, support groups to work towards this standard before referrals are made to them.

Check that community groups and organisations meet in insured premises and that health and safety requirements are in place. Where such policies and procedures are not in place, support groups to work towards this standard before referrals are made to them.

Support local groups to act in accordance with information governance policies and procedures, ensuring compliance with the Data Protection Act. Work collectively with all local partners to ensure community groups are strong and sustainable

Work with commissioners and local partners to identify unmet needs within the community and gaps in community provision.

Support local partners and commissioners to develop new groups and services where needed, through small grants for community groups, micro-commissioning and development support.

Encourage people who have been connected to community support through social prescribing to volunteer and give their time freely to others, in order to build their skills and confidence, and strengthen community resilience.

Develop a team of volunteers within your service to provide buddying support for people, starting new groups and finding creative community solutions to local issues.

Encourage people, their families and carers to provide peer support and to do things together, such as setting up new community groups or volunteering.

Provide a regular confidence survey to community groups receiving referrals, to ensure that they are strong, sustained and have the support they need to be part of social prescribing.

Work sensitively with people, their families and carers to capture key information, enabling tracking of the impact of social prescribing on their health and wellbeing.

Encourage people, their families and carers to provide feedback and to share their stories about the impact of social prescribing on their lives.

Support referral agencies to provide appropriate information about the person they are referring. Use the case management system to track the persons progress. Provide appropriate feedback to referral agencies about the people they referred.

Work closely with GP practices within the PCN to ensure that social prescribing referral codes are inputted to SystmOne and that the persons use of the NHS can be tracked, adhering to data protection legislation and data sharing agreements with the ICB.

Professional development

Work with your line manager to undertake continual personal and professional development, taking an active part in reviewing and developing the roles and responsibilities.

Adhere to organisational policies and procedures, including confidentiality, safeguarding, lone working, information governance, and health and safety.

Work with your line manager to access regular clinical supervision, to enable you to deal effectively with the difficult issues that people present.

Person Specification

Experience

• Driving licence
• Experience of working in primary care
• Experience of working in a GP practice

Qualifications

• Tell us about your skills and experience

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.

Employer name

Billingham and Norton Primary Care Network