Autism Assessment Specialist & Pathway Coordinator

Job summary

Working Full time : 37.5 hours per week

Autism Assessment Specialist & ASD Pathway Coordinator

"Assistant Psychologists/Psychologists or Specialist Speech & Language Therapists are all encouraged to apply."

An exciting opportunity has arisen for an enthusiastic, highly motivated and dynamic Autism Assessment Specialist & Pathway Coordinator within our Community Paediatric Neuro-developmental Team at The Countess of Chester Hospital.

You will be responsible for coordinating and providing a specialist psychology ASD assessment service to children, young people and their families referred to the Community Paediatric team and the ASD Pathway multiagency service at the Trust. You will work with the senior team in supporting and developing the ASD pathway service for West Cheshire patients.

The Community Paediatric Team works within the multi-agency preschool and school aged Autism pathway in West Cheshire.

We would welcome further discussion with any interested candidates and would be pleased to arrange a visit to the Department for you.

Main duties of the job

• To have responsibility for a defined caseload of patients under the supervision of the Clinical Lead.
• To provide specialist assessments of children 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, information from family members, school and other professionals involved in the child's care.
• To take responsibility for ADOS-2 assessment clinics and direct observations of children within a school setting.
• To prepare comprehensive psychological assessment reports contributing to formulation, recommendations, and diagnostic evidence.
• To interpret, score and provide professional opinions on assessments within the autism pathway and contribute to diagnostic formulation discussions.
• To interpret tools such as the Coventry grid and use trauma informed care practises.
• To request and gather additional information to aid assessment pathways where appropriate.
• Using specialist knowledge and expertise, make appropriate and evidence-based recommendations for families and school to effectively support children on the spectrum.

Further duties and details can be found in the job description.

About us

The Countess of Chester Hospital NHS Foundation Trust provides services to West Cheshire and to Welsh patients covered by Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board. The Trust works collaboratively within the wider Cheshire and Merseyside Health and Care Partnership. Its services are provided from three locations:

• The Countess of Chester Hospital: providing 438 general and acute beds.
• Ellesmere Port Hospital: providing 56 beds as a rehabilitation, intermediate and outpatient facility.
• Tarporley War Memorial Hospital: a base for community services which serve the local rural population.

The Trust employs over 6258 staff (headcount) which includes temporary bank staff and provides acute emergency and elective services, primary care direct access services and obstetric services to a population of approximately 407,000. This includes 357,000 residents in Chester and West Cheshire which includes Ellesmere Port and Neston as well as the Deeside area of Flintshire which has a population of approximately 50,000.

The Trust is a busy district general hospital and in 2022/2023, there were more than 503,342 patient attendances (inpatient, outpatient and diagnostic) ranging from a simple outpatient appointment to major cancer surgery. This is an increase of nearly 10,000 compared to the previous year when there were 494,387 patient attendances.