Clinical/Forensic Psychologist

Band 8a (1.0 wte, 37.5 hours)

The North London Forensic Service is based on the Chase Farm Hospital site. It provides inpatient services to North Central London of both medium and low secure forensic care, including a women's service and services designated for forensic patients with learning disabilities. Community services include a low secure unit, assertive outreach teams, criminal justice services including working with the Metropolitan and British Transport Police Forces and working in the area of fixated threat and stalking.

We are looking for an experienced and enthusiastic clinical or forensic psychologist to provide psychology input to the forensic inpatient service. The post holder will be responsible for the psychology input across two clinical teams within the medium and low secure inpatient service. The post holder will hold a clinical caseload and provide both direct and indirect psychological interventions. They will also provide consultation and training to psychologists and other professions. The role will also include the supervision of more junior qualified clinical staff, trainees, students and assistant psychologists as needed.

The department is eclectic and a range of theoretical approaches are welcomed and provided, working individually, in groups and with families. There are also strong established links with the North London clinical psychology training universities.

Main duties of the job

To provide a qualified specialist clinical psychology service to patients under the care of NLFS providing specialist psychological assessment and therapy, at the same time as offering advice and consultation on clients' psychological care to non-psychologist colleagues, and to other, non-professional carers, working autonomously within professional guidelines and the overall framework of the team's policies and procedures. This post will involve psychological input to two teams in the community forensic teams. You will be expected to utilise research skills for audit, policy, service development and research within the area served by the team/service.

About us

Barnet Enfield and Haringey Mental Health NHS Trust provides local, regional and national award-winning healthcare services. We have more than 3.300 staff working out of 20 main sites serving a population of 1.2 million people.We provide community health services and mental health services for young people, adults and older people. Our North London Forensic Service treats and cares for people in the criminal justice system who have mental health conditions. We also provide one of the largest eating disorders services in England, as well as drug and alcohol services.

We are an organisation that is passionate about equality, diversity and inclusion one that prides itself in developing the leadership capabilities of its employees, looking after their health and wellbeing, creating safe spaces for staff to speak up and providing opportunities to mentor and be mentored.Our employees are the reason for delivering Good CQC ratings, excellent outcomes and outstanding patient experiences, so it is our aim to create a happy and healthy working environment where you can thrive and succeed.

Job description

Job responsibilities

MAIN TASKS AND RESPONSIBILITIES:

Clinical:

To provide specialist psychological assessments of clients referred to the team based upon the appropriate use, interpretation and integration of complex data from a variety of sources including psychological and neuropsychological tests, self-report measures, rating scales, direct and indirect structured observations and semi-structured interviews with clients, family members and others involved in the clients care.

To formulate and implement plans for the formal psychological treatment and/or management of a clients mental health problems or behavioural difficulties based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the clients problems, and employing methods based upon evidence of efficacy, across the full range of care settings.

To be responsible for implementing a range of psychological interventions for individuals, carers, families and groups, within and across teams employed individually and in synthesis, adjusting and refining psychological formulations drawing upon different explanatory models and maintaining a number of provisional hypotheses.

To evaluate and make decisions about treatment options taking into account both theoretical and therapeutic models and highly complex factors concerning historical and developmental processes that have shaped the individual, family or group.

To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment, treatment and discharge of clients whose problems are managed by psychologically based standard care plans.

To provide specialist psychological advice guidance and consultation to other professionals contributing directly to clients formulation, diagnosis and treatment plan.

To contribute directly and indirectly to a psychologically based framework of understanding and care to the benefit of all clients of the service, across all settings and agencies serving the client group.

To undertake risk assessment and risk management for individual clients and to provide advice to other professions on psychological aspects of risk assessment and risk management.

To act as care coordinator, where appropriate, taking responsibility for initiating planning and review of care plans under CPA including clients, their carers, referring agents and others involved the network of care.

Consultation, Teaching, Training, and Supervision

To provide consultation and training to other professionals within the unit developing understanding of psychological interventions which will assist with day to day clinical practice.

To receive regular clinical professional supervision from a senior clinical psychologist and, where appropriate, other senior professional colleagues.

To gain additional highly specialist experience and skills relevant to clinical psychology and/or the service (as agreed with the service manager and professional psychology manager).

To develop skills in the area of professional post-graduate teaching, training and supervision and to provide supervision to other MDT staffs psychological work as appropriate.

To provide professional and clinical supervision of junior members of the psychology department including qualified staff and trainees.

To contribute to the pre- and post-qualification teaching of clinical and/or forensic psychology, as appropriate.

To provide advice, consultation and training to staff working with the client group across a range of agencies and settings, where appropriate.

Communication

• To communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner, information concerning the assessment, formulation and treatment plans of clients under their care and to monitor progress during the course of both uni- and multi-disciplinary care.
• Communicate both verbally and in written format regarding complex and sensitive information.
• Communication with the MDT regarding care and treatment planning
• Communication regarding supervision and consultation with other staff.

Patient/Customer Care (if applicable) (both direct and indirect)

• Much of the day-to-day role will involve direct patient contact and consultation to staff within the unit. Providing direct clinical input as described above and communicating with the wider team regarding the treatment provided.

People (HR) Management

• Supervision of the band 7 psychologist, trainee and student psychologists when on placement, and assistant psychologists.
• Providing training and consultation to the wider team as required.

Information Management

• Responsible for keeping good quality clinical records that comply with data protection legislation and Trust policies and protocols.
• Produce reports following each assessment and intervention.

Service Development

• Contributing to the development of the service.
• Contributing to service evaluation and peer review as required.

Person Specification

Education and Qualifications

Essential

• Doctoral level training in clinical psychology. Doctoral or Masters level training in forensic psychology with full competencies completed. Registration with HCPC.

Desirable

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

EXPERIENCE AND KNOWLEDGE

Essential

• Experience of specialist psychological assessment and treatment of clients across a range of care settings, which can include outpatient, community, primary care and inpatient 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 emotive and distressing problems and where there is a history of violence.
• Experience of working within a forensic setting/service.
• Experience of teaching, training and/or supervision.

Desirable

• Experience of the application of psychology in different cultural contexts.
• Knowledge of legislation in relation to the client group and mental health.

SKILLS AND ABILITIES

Essential

• Skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration.
• Well-developed skills in the ability to communicate effectively, orally and in writing, 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 non-professional groups.
• Able to contain explore and formulate an understanding of high levels of distress both directly with patients and indirectly via supervision or case reviews with other staff.
• Evidence of continuing professional development as recommended by the BPS.

Desirable

• Skill in the theory and practice of specialised psychological therapies in working with mentally disordered offenders.
• Formal training in supervision of other psychologists.

PERSONAL QUALITIES

Essential

• Flexible, engaging and approachable who can work quickly and responsively with both clients and the multidisciplinary team.
• Creative in approach as well as reflective about their own practice.
• Able to work autonomously as well as under supervision and with colleagues

OTHER REQUIREMENTS

Essential

• Ability to teach and train others, using a variety of complex multi-media materials suitable for presentations within public, professional and academic settings.
• Ability to identify and employ mechanisms of clinical governance as appropriate, to support and maintain clinical practice in the face of regular exposure to highly emotive material and challenging behaviour.

Employer details

Employer name

Barnet, Enfield & Haringey Mental Health NHS Trust

Address

Chase Farm Hospital

The Ridgeway

Enfield

Any attachments will be accessible after you click to apply.

306-BEH-1267