Highly Specialised Clinical / Counselling Psychologist

Job description

Job responsibilities

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

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

1. To be responsible for implementing a range of psychological interventions for individual children and young people, 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.

1. 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.

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

1. To provide specialist psychological advice, guidance and consultation to other professionals contributing directly to child or young persons formulation, diagnosis and treatment plan.

1. To ensure that all members of the treating team have access to a psychologically based framework for understanding and care of client children and young people of the service, through the provision of advice and consultation and the dissemination of psychological research and theory.

1. To undertake risk assessment and risk management for individual children and young people and to provide general advice to other professionals on psychological aspects of risk assessment and management.

1. To coordinate care, ensuring the provision of a care package appropriate for the child or young persons needs, coordinating the work of others involved with care, tasking responsibility for arranging reviews as required and communicating effectively with the child or young person, his/her family and all others involved in the network of care, and to monitor progress during the course of multi-disciplinary interventions.

1. To communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner, information concerning the assessment, formulation and treatment plans of children and young people under their care and to monitor and evaluate progress during the course of both uni- and multi-disciplinary care.

1. To provide expertise, advice and support to facilitate the effective and appropriate provision of psychological care by all members of the treatment team.

Person Specification

Training and Qualifications

Essential

• Qualified Clinical Psychologist
• Professional registration as a Practitioner Psychologist under the Health Care Professions Council

Desirable

• Post-doctoral/graduate training in one or more additional specialised areas of psychological practice with children and young people
• Clinical training as part of a CYP IAPT collaborative in a recognised evidenced based approach i.e. CBT, Parenting Skills or other.

Experience

Essential

• Substantial experience of working as a qualified psychologist including experience of working at a highly specialist level with children and young people with a wide range of mental and behavioural disorders
• Experience of working with a wide variety of client groups, across the whole life course and presenting with the full range of clinical severity across the full range of care settings including outpatient, community, primary care, in-patient and residential care settings.
• Experience of teaching, training and professional and clinical supervision
• Experience of service development and leadership.

Desirable

• Experience of representing psychology within the context of multi-disciplinary care.
• Experience of working with mental health needs in multiple cultural contexts.
• Experience of managing the clinical performance of staff

Knowledge & Skills

Essential

• High-level skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management in relation to children and young people with severe and complex mental physical and behavioural conditions
• Excellent skills in effective communication, both orally and in writing, of highly technical and clinically sensitive information to children and young people, their families, carers and other professional colleagues.
• Skills in providing consultation to other professional and non-professional groups
• Knowledge of research design and methodology, including qualitative methods and complex multivariate data analysis
• Knowledge of UK legislation in relation to health and welfare services for children and young people and in relation to child mental health.

Desirable

• Well-developed knowledge of the theory and practice of specialised psychological therapies in specific difficult to treat groups (e.g. children and young people with complex needs, personality disorder, dual diagnoses, people with additional disabilities).

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.

Certificate of Sponsorship

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).

Employer details

Employer name

South West London and St Georges Mental Health NHS Trust

Address

Jubilee Health Centre

Shotfield

Wallington

SM6 0HY

Employer's website

https://www.swlstg.nhs.uk/ (Opens in a new tab)