Job summary
The SLAM Addictions Clinical Academic Group, and South London Partnership (SLP) are collaborating to support the needs of those with co-occurring mental health and substance use needs on the inpatient rehabilitation wards within the SLP footprint:Barefoot Lodge (Oxleas); Heather Close, Westways and Tony Hillis Unit (South London & Maudsley); and Burntwood Villas and Phoenix (Southwest London & St George's).
The Co-occurring Mental Health and Addictions Rehabilitation Team (COMHART) has been coproduced with the SLP and the wards to ensure integration into the units' model of care. COMHART and inpatient multidisciplinary teams are working together to create a trauma-informed, anti-racist team culture with consistent ways of working to optimise recovery outcomes of people with mental health and substance use needs. The post holder will work under the supervision of psychology and other clinical staff within the service and alongside established staff on the rehabilitation wards to ensure there is a full multi-disciplinary response.
This pilot project has been extended to June 2025 and can be arranged a secondment. The project and post may be extended beyond this date. The post holder will be expected to help plan and engage in the evaluation process. The service's usual working hours are Monday to Friday 9am to 5pm.
Main duties of the job
The post holder will provide a qualified specialist psychology/psychotherapy service to people admitted to the mental health inpatient rehabilitation units across the SLP footprint. They contribute towards supervising Assistant Psychologists. They will deputise for the Principal Clinical Psychologist to provide day to day support to other clinical staff funded within the service. This is to ensure that there is a full multi-disciplinary response and ensuring that good quality clinical and professional supervision is maintained. The post holder will support the senior leadership team to develop service evaluation processes, contribute to the collection of evaluation and outcome data, as well as ensuring that the service works alongside a newly commissioned peer support offer to each of the wards.
About us
South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust (SLaM) provide the widest range of NHS mental health services in the UK as well as substance misuse services for people who are addicted to drugs and alcohol. We work closely with the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience (IoPPN), King's College London and are part of King's Health Partners Academic Health Sciences Centre. There are very few organisations in the world that have such wide-ranging capabilities working with mental illness. Our scope is unique because it is built on three major foundations: care and treatment, science and research, and training.
Job description
Job responsibilities
Key Responsibilities:
Clinical & Client Care
- To provide specialist psychological assessments of clients referred to the team based upon the appropriate use, interpretation & integration of complex data from a variety of sources including psychological & neuropsychological tests, self-report measures, rating scales, direct & indirect structured observations & semi-structured interviews with clients, family members & others involved in the clients care.
- To formulate & implement plans for the formal psychological treatment &/or management of a clients mental health problems, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the clients problems, & employing methods based upon evidence of efficacy, across the full range of care settings.
- To be responsible for implementing a range of psychological/psychotherapy interventions for individuals, carers, families & groups, within & across teams employed individually & in synthesis, adjusting & refining psychological/psychotherapy formulations drawing upon different explanatory models & maintaining a number of provisional hypotheses.
- To evaluate & make decisions about treatment options taking into account both theoretical & therapeutic models & highly complex factors concerning historical & developmental processes that have shaped the individual, family or group.
- To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment, treatment & discharge of clients whose problems are managed by psychologically based standard care plans.
- To provide specialist psychological/psychotherapy advice, guidance & consultation to other professionals contributing directly to clients formulation, diagnosis & treatment plan.
- To contribute directly & indirectly to a psychologically based framework of understanding & care to the benefit of all clients of the service, across all settings & agencies serving the client group.
- To undertake risk assessment & risk management for individual clients & to provide advice to other professions on psychological aspects of risk assessment & risk management.
- To communicate in a skilled & sensitive manner, information concerning the assessment, formulation & treatment plans of clients under their care & to monitor progress during the course of both uni- & multi-disciplinary care.
- To provide culturally appropriate psychological/psychotherapy interventions with carers or families of referred clients.
Responsibilities for team or service clinical functioning
- To contribute towards the development of psychologically, anti-racist & trauma-informed framework for the service.
- To contribute towards the services delivery of accessible & acceptable services to diverse local communities.
- To be proactive in challenging discrimination & support the development of culturally competent services.
- To advise junior members of the service on specialist psychological care of clients.
- To liaise with referrers, GPs & other professionals concerned with clients in order to develop & review care plans.
Teaching, Training & Supervision
- To receive regular clinical professional supervision from a senior clinical psychologist &, where appropriate, other senior professional colleagues.
- To develop skills in the area of professional post-graduate teaching, training & supervision & to provide supervision to other MDT staffs psychological work, as appropriate.
- To provide professional & clinical supervision of assistant/graduate psychologists &, as appropriate, to contribute to the supervision of individual cases for trainee clinical psychologists.
- To contribute to the pre- & post-qualification teaching of clinical &/or counselling psychology, as appropriate.
- To provide advice, consultation & training to staff working with the client group across a range of agencies & settings, where appropriate.
- To contribute to the development of the knowledge & skills base within the service & the rehabilitation wards by maintaining an active awareness of current developments in psychology & addictions & by implementing knowledge gained in practice.
- To disseminate research & service evaluation findings through presentations & published articles.
Management, Recruitment, Policy & Service Development
- To implement policies & procedures in own area of work.
- To identify any aspects of the service which could be improved & propose changes to practices or procedures that affect the rehabilitation offer on the wards & with partner agencies.
- To contribute to the development, evaluation & monitoring of the teams operational policies & services, through the deployment of professional skills in research, service evaluation & audit.
- To advise both service & professional management on those aspects of the service where psychological &/or organisational matters need addressing.
- To manage the workloads of assistant & graduate psychologists, within the framework of the team/services policies & procedures.
- To be involved, as appropriate, in the shortlisting & interviewing of assistant/graduate psychologists.
- In the absence of senior psychologists to co-ordinate (& chair) meetings for the team to ensure effective functioning & review these structures across the wards when appropriate.
- To contribute towards the consultation & engagement of service users in planning & delivering services which meet the needs of local communities.
Research & Service Evaluation
- To utilise theory, evidence-based literature, & research to support evidence-based practice in individual work & work with other team members.
- To undertake appropriate research & provide research advice to other staff undertaking research.
- To undertake project management, including complex audit & service evaluation, with colleagues within the service to help develop service provision.
Job description
Job responsibilities
Key Responsibilities:
Clinical & Client Care
- To provide specialist psychological assessments of clients referred to the team based upon the appropriate use, interpretation & integration of complex data from a variety of sources including psychological & neuropsychological tests, self-report measures, rating scales, direct & indirect structured observations & semi-structured interviews with clients, family members & others involved in the clients care.
- To formulate & implement plans for the formal psychological treatment &/or management of a clients mental health problems, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the clients problems, & employing methods based upon evidence of efficacy, across the full range of care settings.
- To be responsible for implementing a range of psychological/psychotherapy interventions for individuals, carers, families & groups, within & across teams employed individually & in synthesis, adjusting & refining psychological/psychotherapy formulations drawing upon different explanatory models & maintaining a number of provisional hypotheses.
- To evaluate & make decisions about treatment options taking into account both theoretical & therapeutic models & highly complex factors concerning historical & developmental processes that have shaped the individual, family or group.
- To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment, treatment & discharge of clients whose problems are managed by psychologically based standard care plans.
- To provide specialist psychological/psychotherapy advice, guidance & consultation to other professionals contributing directly to clients formulation, diagnosis & treatment plan.
- To contribute directly & indirectly to a psychologically based framework of understanding & care to the benefit of all clients of the service, across all settings & agencies serving the client group.
- To undertake risk assessment & risk management for individual clients & to provide advice to other professions on psychological aspects of risk assessment & risk management.
- To communicate in a skilled & sensitive manner, information concerning the assessment, formulation & treatment plans of clients under their care & to monitor progress during the course of both uni- & multi-disciplinary care.
- To provide culturally appropriate psychological/psychotherapy interventions with carers or families of referred clients.
Responsibilities for team or service clinical functioning
- To contribute towards the development of psychologically, anti-racist & trauma-informed framework for the service.
- To contribute towards the services delivery of accessible & acceptable services to diverse local communities.
- To be proactive in challenging discrimination & support the development of culturally competent services.
- To advise junior members of the service on specialist psychological care of clients.
- To liaise with referrers, GPs & other professionals concerned with clients in order to develop & review care plans.
Teaching, Training & Supervision
- To receive regular clinical professional supervision from a senior clinical psychologist &, where appropriate, other senior professional colleagues.
- To develop skills in the area of professional post-graduate teaching, training & supervision & to provide supervision to other MDT staffs psychological work, as appropriate.
- To provide professional & clinical supervision of assistant/graduate psychologists &, as appropriate, to contribute to the supervision of individual cases for trainee clinical psychologists.
- To contribute to the pre- & post-qualification teaching of clinical &/or counselling psychology, as appropriate.
- To provide advice, consultation & training to staff working with the client group across a range of agencies & settings, where appropriate.
- To contribute to the development of the knowledge & skills base within the service & the rehabilitation wards by maintaining an active awareness of current developments in psychology & addictions & by implementing knowledge gained in practice.
- To disseminate research & service evaluation findings through presentations & published articles.
Management, Recruitment, Policy & Service Development
- To implement policies & procedures in own area of work.
- To identify any aspects of the service which could be improved & propose changes to practices or procedures that affect the rehabilitation offer on the wards & with partner agencies.
- To contribute to the development, evaluation & monitoring of the teams operational policies & services, through the deployment of professional skills in research, service evaluation & audit.
- To advise both service & professional management on those aspects of the service where psychological &/or organisational matters need addressing.
- To manage the workloads of assistant & graduate psychologists, within the framework of the team/services policies & procedures.
- To be involved, as appropriate, in the shortlisting & interviewing of assistant/graduate psychologists.
- In the absence of senior psychologists to co-ordinate (& chair) meetings for the team to ensure effective functioning & review these structures across the wards when appropriate.
- To contribute towards the consultation & engagement of service users in planning & delivering services which meet the needs of local communities.
Research & Service Evaluation
- To utilise theory, evidence-based literature, & research to support evidence-based practice in individual work & work with other team members.
- To undertake appropriate research & provide research advice to other staff undertaking research.
- To undertake project management, including complex audit & service evaluation, with colleagues within the service to help develop service provision.
Person Specification
Training and qualifications
Essential
- oEntry-level qualification in Applied Psychology/Psychotherapists profession and demonstrable practice in this field (professional Doctorate, or combination of MSc plus PG Diploma level additional training) that has been accepted by the HCPC/BABCP/UKCP for purposes of professional registration. Registered with the HCPC/BABCP/UKCP as a Practitioner Psychologist/Psychotherapist, and evidence of continuing professional development as required by these professional bodies.
Desirable
- oPre-qualification training and qualifications in research methodology, staff training and/or other fields of applied psychology
- oTraining in Motivational interviewing and CBT for psychosis and/or addictions interventions.
- oCompletion of training in clinical supervision.
Experience
Essential
- oExperience of specialist psychological/psychotherapy assessment and treatment of clients across the full range of care settings, including outpatient, community, primary care and in patient settings
- oExperience 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
Desirable
- oExperience of teaching, training and/or supervision
- oExperience of the application of clinical psychology in different cultural contexts
- oExperience of working within a multicultural framework and addressing issues of diversity within local communities
Knowledge and Skills
Essential
- oSkills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration
- oWell-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.
- oSkills in providing consultation to other professional and non-professional groups
- oDoctoral level knowledge of research methodology, research design and complex, multivariate data analysis as practiced within the clinical fields of psychology and psychotherapy
Desirable
- oKnowledge of the theory and practice of specialised psychological therapies in specific difficult to treat groups (e.g. personality disorder, dual diagnoses, people with additional disabilities etc)
- oHigh level knowledge of the theory and practice of at least two specialised psychological therapies
- oKnowledge of legislation in relation to the psychiatric rehabilitation client group and mental health issues, child and adult protection, and equalities
Other
Essential
- oAbility to teach and train others, using a variety of complex multimedia materials suitable for presentations within public, professional and academic settings
- oAbility 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
Desirable
- oPersonal experience of mental health problems
- oWell-developed IT skills including entry and analysis of clinical and research data
- oRecord of publications in either peer reviewed, academic or professional journals/books
Person Specification
Training and qualifications
Essential
- oEntry-level qualification in Applied Psychology/Psychotherapists profession and demonstrable practice in this field (professional Doctorate, or combination of MSc plus PG Diploma level additional training) that has been accepted by the HCPC/BABCP/UKCP for purposes of professional registration. Registered with the HCPC/BABCP/UKCP as a Practitioner Psychologist/Psychotherapist, and evidence of continuing professional development as required by these professional bodies.
Desirable
- oPre-qualification training and qualifications in research methodology, staff training and/or other fields of applied psychology
- oTraining in Motivational interviewing and CBT for psychosis and/or addictions interventions.
- oCompletion of training in clinical supervision.
Experience
Essential
- oExperience of specialist psychological/psychotherapy assessment and treatment of clients across the full range of care settings, including outpatient, community, primary care and in patient settings
- oExperience 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
Desirable
- oExperience of teaching, training and/or supervision
- oExperience of the application of clinical psychology in different cultural contexts
- oExperience of working within a multicultural framework and addressing issues of diversity within local communities
Knowledge and Skills
Essential
- oSkills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration
- oWell-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.
- oSkills in providing consultation to other professional and non-professional groups
- oDoctoral level knowledge of research methodology, research design and complex, multivariate data analysis as practiced within the clinical fields of psychology and psychotherapy
Desirable
- oKnowledge of the theory and practice of specialised psychological therapies in specific difficult to treat groups (e.g. personality disorder, dual diagnoses, people with additional disabilities etc)
- oHigh level knowledge of the theory and practice of at least two specialised psychological therapies
- oKnowledge of legislation in relation to the psychiatric rehabilitation client group and mental health issues, child and adult protection, and equalities
Other
Essential
- oAbility to teach and train others, using a variety of complex multimedia materials suitable for presentations within public, professional and academic settings
- oAbility 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
Desirable
- oPersonal experience of mental health problems
- oWell-developed IT skills including entry and analysis of clinical and research data
- oRecord of publications in either peer reviewed, academic or professional journals/books
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).
