Job summary
We are offering a Golden Hello (10% of starting salary) for those in post for 2 years.
An excellent opportunity has arisen for an experienced Clinical or Forensic Psychologist, who is passionate about working with women who require secure care, to join the Women's Forensic Service within the West London Specialist and Forensic Service. This is a part time 8B post (0.8wte) based on the Enhanced Medium secure wards in The Orchard Unit.
West London NHS Trust provides a broad range of forensic mental health care in adult male, female and adolescent services, across high, medium and low security settings, as well as in a community and court diversion setting. The trust provides specialist forensic mental health care across eight boroughs in North West London, in addition to national enhanced medium and high secure services.
The Orchard Unit is a purpose built women-only medium secure unit, where the emphasis is on relational security. It provides a twenty bedded national Women's Enhanced Medium Secure Service (WEMSS) and twenty five medium secure (MS) and fifteen low secure (LS) beds for patients from North West London. You will work within the Enhanced Medium secure wards with a warm, supportive and experienced Multi-Disciplinary Team. Within the Orchard we provide secure care for service-users, who have complex needs related to serious mental illness, personality disorder and offending behaviour,
Main duties of the job
Working within the Women's service will provide you with the opportunity to work within the country's largest NHS provider of female medium / low secure services with women with diagnoses of personality disorders and /or mental illness who have a history of either offending or high risk behaviours. Alongside a Consultant Clinical Psychologist, you will be responsible for providing a high quality psychology service to 2 ten-bedded enhanced medium secure wards. As a key member of the MDT, you will be responsible for developing and implementing psychologically informed treatment for a very diverse group of female service users who are detained in medium and low secure settings, who are mentally disordered offenders with severe and enduring mental disorders (both mental illness and personality disorder) and serious forensic histories and have a wide range of psychiatric, psychological and criminological problems and extremely complex needs. As such you'll be able to utilise varied skills in assessment, formulation and group and individual evidence-based intervention tailored to meet the challenging needs of the inpatient client group. You will also be responsible for developing and implementing group based interventions for the Women's forensic service.
As well as direct clinical work the role will involve service development and audit, staff training / supervision and frequent collaborative working within the psychological therapies department and with MDT colleagues.
About us
West London NHS Trust is one of the most diverse providers of mental and physical health, community and social care in the UK.
Our 3,982 staff care for people in hospital and in the community, helping them to recover and go on to lead full and productive lives. We aim to be the best organisation of our kind in the country.
We provide care and treatment for more than 800,000 people living in the London boroughs of Ealing, Hammersmith & Fulham and Hounslow, delivering services in the community (at home, in GP surgeries and care homes), hospital, specialist clinics and forensic (secure) units.
We arerated good overall by the Care Quality Commission (CQC).
Together, we're committed to promoting hope and wellbeing, working with patients, service users, carers, families and partners across the communities we serve.
We are keen to ensure that our workforce reflects the community it serves, particularly in terms of ethnicity, gender, disability, LGBTQ+ and experience of mental illness.
Job description
Job responsibilities
CLINICAL RESPONSIBILITIES
1. To provide a comprehensive psychology service to service users who are detained in medium and low secure settings, who are mentally disordered offenders, who have severe and enduring mental disorders (both mental illness and personality disorder) and serious forensic histories and have a wide range of psychiatric, psychological and criminological problems and extremely complex needs.
2. To provide specialist psychological assessments of service users referred to psychological services, including suitability for admission, diagnosis, general and forensic risk, progress and suitability for discharge. These assessments will be 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 service users and others involved in the clients care.
3. To provide specialist psychological assessments of service users in the community referred to psychological services, including specialist assessments for Criminal and Family Courts, and for Social Services Departments. These assessments will be 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 service users and others involved in the clients care.
4. To formulate and implement plans for the formal psychological treatment and/or management of a patients mental health problems/high risk behaviours, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the patients problems, and employing methods based upon evidence of efficacy.
5. To be responsible for implementing a range of psychological interventions for individuals and groups, employed individually and in synthesis, adjusting and refining psychological formulations, drawing upon different explanatory models and maintaining a number of provisional hypotheses.
6. 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, and the constraints and restrictions imposed by working in a secure environment.
7. To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment, initiation and termination of psychological treatment in accordance with CPA procedures.
8. To provide specialist consultation, advice and support on psychological approaches to the management of people with serious mental disorders and serious forensic histories, who are being seen by other professional staff in the team and to referrers in secondary, tertiary and, for community service users, primary mental health systems, as well as those in the criminal justice system and voluntary sectors
9. To undertake on-going risk assessment and management of mentally disordered offenders, including the use of formal risk assessment procedures where appropriate, and to provide advice to other professions on psychological aspects of forensic risk assessment and risk management.
10. To bring to the work an awareness of how aspects of social difference - e.g. gender, race(ism), class, culture, religion, (dis)ability, sexuality are contexts that shape our experiences and that involve positions of differential power and privilege. To work effectively with service users and families with diverse backgrounds and identities and to seek to address issues of differential power in the work.
11. To communicate the outcome of assessment and therapy to the referrer, the multi-disciplinary team and the wider health, social care and criminal justice system, as appropriate. This will include the production of formal written reports, including legal reports for Mental Health Review Tribunals and the attendance at court as an expert witness as appropriate.
12. To communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner with service users and other professionals in relation to all aspects of the post-holders work, including advisory and support services. This will include feedback to service users who are compulsorily detained and who have severe mental disorders and a heightened potential for hostile reactions.
13. To provide expertise, advice and support to facilitate the effective and appropriate provision of psychological care by all members of the team.
Job description
Job responsibilities
CLINICAL RESPONSIBILITIES
1. To provide a comprehensive psychology service to service users who are detained in medium and low secure settings, who are mentally disordered offenders, who have severe and enduring mental disorders (both mental illness and personality disorder) and serious forensic histories and have a wide range of psychiatric, psychological and criminological problems and extremely complex needs.
2. To provide specialist psychological assessments of service users referred to psychological services, including suitability for admission, diagnosis, general and forensic risk, progress and suitability for discharge. These assessments will be 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 service users and others involved in the clients care.
3. To provide specialist psychological assessments of service users in the community referred to psychological services, including specialist assessments for Criminal and Family Courts, and for Social Services Departments. These assessments will be 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 service users and others involved in the clients care.
4. To formulate and implement plans for the formal psychological treatment and/or management of a patients mental health problems/high risk behaviours, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the patients problems, and employing methods based upon evidence of efficacy.
5. To be responsible for implementing a range of psychological interventions for individuals and groups, employed individually and in synthesis, adjusting and refining psychological formulations, drawing upon different explanatory models and maintaining a number of provisional hypotheses.
6. 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, and the constraints and restrictions imposed by working in a secure environment.
7. To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment, initiation and termination of psychological treatment in accordance with CPA procedures.
8. To provide specialist consultation, advice and support on psychological approaches to the management of people with serious mental disorders and serious forensic histories, who are being seen by other professional staff in the team and to referrers in secondary, tertiary and, for community service users, primary mental health systems, as well as those in the criminal justice system and voluntary sectors
9. To undertake on-going risk assessment and management of mentally disordered offenders, including the use of formal risk assessment procedures where appropriate, and to provide advice to other professions on psychological aspects of forensic risk assessment and risk management.
10. To bring to the work an awareness of how aspects of social difference - e.g. gender, race(ism), class, culture, religion, (dis)ability, sexuality are contexts that shape our experiences and that involve positions of differential power and privilege. To work effectively with service users and families with diverse backgrounds and identities and to seek to address issues of differential power in the work.
11. To communicate the outcome of assessment and therapy to the referrer, the multi-disciplinary team and the wider health, social care and criminal justice system, as appropriate. This will include the production of formal written reports, including legal reports for Mental Health Review Tribunals and the attendance at court as an expert witness as appropriate.
12. To communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner with service users and other professionals in relation to all aspects of the post-holders work, including advisory and support services. This will include feedback to service users who are compulsorily detained and who have severe mental disorders and a heightened potential for hostile reactions.
13. To provide expertise, advice and support to facilitate the effective and appropriate provision of psychological care by all members of the team.
Person Specification
Qualifications
Essential
- Post-graduate doctorate in clinical / forensic psychology (or its equivalent for those trained prior to 1996 or those in lateral transfer) as accredited by the BPS.
- Registration with the Health and Care Professions Council
- Completion of further post-doctoral post-qualification specialist training including training in supervision of trainee clinical / forensic psychologists
Desirable
- Pre-qualification training and qualifications in research methodology, staff training and/or other fields of applied psychology.
- Other related academic qualifications
Experience
Essential
- Substantial post-doctoral qualified experience with the client group of the post or a related client group.
- Experience of specialist psychological assessment and treatment of clients across the full range of care settings, including 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 highly emotive and distressing problems, verbal abuse and the threat of physical abuse.
- Experience and/or formal training in the supervision of trainee and qualified clinical / forensic psychologists.
- Experience of having facilitated/co-facilitated psychological therapy groups
Desirable
- Experience of working clinically with female service users in secure settings
- Experience of the application of clinical psychology in different cultural contexts.
- Experience of administration, scoring and written interpretation of formal personality tools and/or neuropsychological assessments
Knowledge
Essential
- Skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration.
- Able to make judgements involving complex facts or situations, which require the evaluation of a range of options (e.g. the assessment of specialist clinical conditions and the determination of treatment options)
- Able to plan, prioritise and organise own patient caseload, treatment programmes involving other staff, and other aspects of the work such as research activity.
- 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.
- Doctoral level knowledge of research methodology, research design and complex, multivariate data analysis as practiced within the clinical fields of psychology.
- Ability to teach and train others, using a variety of complex multimedia materials suitable for presentations within public, professional and academic settings.
- Knowledge of legislation in relation to the client group, mental health and child protection.
- Evidence of continuing professional development as recommended by the BPS.
Desirable
- Experience of training multi-disciplinary staff
- Experience of consultation and/or supervision within a multi-agency context
- High level knowledge of the theory and practice of at least two specialised psychological therapies and assessment methodologies.
- Specialist knowledge of the assessment and treatment of trauma.
- Specialist theoretical and practical knowledge of the assessment and treatment of personality disorder and mental illness.
Skills
Essential
- Able to provide and receive highly complex, highly sensitive or highly contentious information, where there are significant barriers to acceptance which need to be overcome using the highest level of interpersonal and communication skills such as would be required when communicating in a hostile, antagonistic or highly emotive atmosphere
- Able to make judgements involving highly complex facts or situations, which require the evaluation of a range of options (e.g. the assessment of specialist clinical conditions and the determination of treatment options), Where expert opinions may differ
- Able to plan, prioritise and organise own service user caseload, treatment programmes (individual or group) involving other staff, and other aspects of the work such as research activity
- Keyboard skills
- Able to maintain intense concentration frequently and for prolonged periods with unpredictable patients (e.g. in the assessment and treatment of mentally disordered offender patients)
- Able to function in potentially traumatic circumstances and in highly emotionally distressing circumstances on a frequent basis (e.g. in dealing with patients with serious mental illness, histories of homicide and serious violence, self-harm, sexual abuse)
- Able to provide services in environments with patients who are disturbed and sometimes violent and where the awareness of the risk of assault must always be maintained
- Able to "hold" the stress of patients compulsorily detained in a secure hospital
- Ability to identify, provide and promote appropriate means of support to carers and staff exposed to highly distressing situations and severely challenging behaviours.
- Able to respond adaptably to rapidly changing service demands
Desirable
Person Specification
Qualifications
Essential
- Post-graduate doctorate in clinical / forensic psychology (or its equivalent for those trained prior to 1996 or those in lateral transfer) as accredited by the BPS.
- Registration with the Health and Care Professions Council
- Completion of further post-doctoral post-qualification specialist training including training in supervision of trainee clinical / forensic psychologists
Desirable
- Pre-qualification training and qualifications in research methodology, staff training and/or other fields of applied psychology.
- Other related academic qualifications
Experience
Essential
- Substantial post-doctoral qualified experience with the client group of the post or a related client group.
- Experience of specialist psychological assessment and treatment of clients across the full range of care settings, including 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 highly emotive and distressing problems, verbal abuse and the threat of physical abuse.
- Experience and/or formal training in the supervision of trainee and qualified clinical / forensic psychologists.
- Experience of having facilitated/co-facilitated psychological therapy groups
Desirable
- Experience of working clinically with female service users in secure settings
- Experience of the application of clinical psychology in different cultural contexts.
- Experience of administration, scoring and written interpretation of formal personality tools and/or neuropsychological assessments
Knowledge
Essential
- Skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration.
- Able to make judgements involving complex facts or situations, which require the evaluation of a range of options (e.g. the assessment of specialist clinical conditions and the determination of treatment options)
- Able to plan, prioritise and organise own patient caseload, treatment programmes involving other staff, and other aspects of the work such as research activity.
- 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.
- Doctoral level knowledge of research methodology, research design and complex, multivariate data analysis as practiced within the clinical fields of psychology.
- Ability to teach and train others, using a variety of complex multimedia materials suitable for presentations within public, professional and academic settings.
- Knowledge of legislation in relation to the client group, mental health and child protection.
- Evidence of continuing professional development as recommended by the BPS.
Desirable
- Experience of training multi-disciplinary staff
- Experience of consultation and/or supervision within a multi-agency context
- High level knowledge of the theory and practice of at least two specialised psychological therapies and assessment methodologies.
- Specialist knowledge of the assessment and treatment of trauma.
- Specialist theoretical and practical knowledge of the assessment and treatment of personality disorder and mental illness.
Skills
Essential
- Able to provide and receive highly complex, highly sensitive or highly contentious information, where there are significant barriers to acceptance which need to be overcome using the highest level of interpersonal and communication skills such as would be required when communicating in a hostile, antagonistic or highly emotive atmosphere
- Able to make judgements involving highly complex facts or situations, which require the evaluation of a range of options (e.g. the assessment of specialist clinical conditions and the determination of treatment options), Where expert opinions may differ
- Able to plan, prioritise and organise own service user caseload, treatment programmes (individual or group) involving other staff, and other aspects of the work such as research activity
- Keyboard skills
- Able to maintain intense concentration frequently and for prolonged periods with unpredictable patients (e.g. in the assessment and treatment of mentally disordered offender patients)
- Able to function in potentially traumatic circumstances and in highly emotionally distressing circumstances on a frequent basis (e.g. in dealing with patients with serious mental illness, histories of homicide and serious violence, self-harm, sexual abuse)
- Able to provide services in environments with patients who are disturbed and sometimes violent and where the awareness of the risk of assault must always be maintained
- Able to "hold" the stress of patients compulsorily detained in a secure hospital
- Ability to identify, provide and promote appropriate means of support to carers and staff exposed to highly distressing situations and severely challenging behaviours.
- Able to respond adaptably to rapidly changing service demands
Desirable
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.
Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).
From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).
UK Registration
Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see
NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).
Additional information
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.
Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).
From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).
UK Registration
Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see
NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).
