Job summary
An exciting opportunity has arisen for an experienced Advanced Clinical Practitioner (ACP) to join our dedicated At-Risk Mental State (ARMS) Service in North Kent. In this vital role, you will be a clinical cornerstone of our specialist early intervention pathway, delivering high-quality assessments, formulations, and holistic interventions when they matter most.

As a senior clinician, you won't just manage a caseload--you will help shape the future of our service. You will provide strong professional leadership, mentor junior colleagues, and collaborate across agencies to ensure our service users receive seamless, world-class care.

What You'll Do
Your role is dynamic and multi-factorial, structured around the four core pillars of advanced practice:

• Expert Clinical Practice (70% Focus): Lead complex clinical assessments, develop comprehensive formulations, and utilize your skills as an Independent Prescriber to deliver holistic, evidence-based treatments.
• Professional Leadership & Consultancy: Act as a clinical role model, strengthening professional leadership within the team and supporting the growth and practice of junior clinicians.
• Education, Training & Development: Foster a culture of continuous learning by sharing your expertise and mentoring colleagues across the multidisciplinary landscape.
• Service Development & Innovation: Drive the quality of our care forward through clinical audits, service evaluations, and practice development initiatives.

Main duties of the job
You will be an integral part of a warm, collaborative, and highly skilled multidisciplinary team (MDT) that includes Nurses, Doctors, Occupational Therapists, Psychologists, and dedicated non-registered healthcare professionals. We pride ourselves on a supportive culture where every voice is valued, working together within defined clinical standards to achieve the best outcomes for North Kent.

• Carry out and coordinate comprehensive, systematic holistic assessments which take account of relevant mental, physical, social, cultural, psychological, spiritual, and environmental factors, in partnership with service user and others through interaction, observation and measurement.
• Work collaboratively with other disciplines, service user and their carers to formulate and agree a holistic person-centred care plan that addresses the needs identified through assessment.
• Deliver and evaluate safe, person centred care in partnership with the service user and their carers to support recovery.
• Act as a clinical leader supporting the development of best practice in line with trust policy and NICE guidance.
• Facilitate and review approved Quality Improvement initiatives within the care setting

About us
We are Kent and Medway Mental Health NHS Trust. We care for the mental health and wellbeing of people across Kent and Medway and are rated 'Good' by the Care Quality Commission (CQC). Our teams support children, youngpeopleand adults with a wide range of mental health needs. We also provide specialist services, including all-age eating disorder services and neurodevelopmental assessments for children and young people, such as autism and ADHD. Because we work across the whole county and across hospital and community settings, we can make care more joined up and easier to access for the people we serve. Our vision is simple: we are here to help communities not just live with mentalillness, butlive well. It's why we're passionate about working with communities to make mental health care better for everyone. Everything we do is guided by our values: caring, inclusive, curious and confident. Join us if you share our passion for better mental health care and want to be part of a team that's working well together. We are serious about diversity and inclusion, and we are working hard to build this into our DNA. We warmly welcome applications for any of our roles from people from diverse backgrounds, and we are proactively encouraging applications from under-represented communities for our more senior roles, like this one.

Job responsibilities
Please see the attached job description for full details of the main duties and responsibilities of the role.

The post holder must hold a full, valid, UK driving licence and have access to a car/vehicle to use for business purposes (unless you have a disability as defined by the Equality Act 2010).
Person Specification
Knowledge, Skills, Training and Experience
Essential

• Current NMC registration ACP, MSc
• Degree level education
• Clinical assessment and formulation skills in acute mental health practice, Professionally functions within a professional accountability framework
• Mentorship qualification
• Extensive post qualifying experience
• Experience of successfully resolving complex problems
• Experience of working in an acute mental health setting
• Experience of working in a range of mental health setting
• Experience of Research, evaluation, development and quality improvement approaches
• Ability to produce mental health reports e.g. MHA Tribunal reports
• Highly developed communication, influencing and negotiating skills
• Ability to prioritise and meet deadlines
• Ability to use initiative and make decisions.
• Organisational and presentation skills
• Knowledge of clinical governance processes and how they underpin care delivery
• Knowledge of national and local NHS healthcare agenda and its implications.
• Knowledge of mental health legislation (MHA, MCA/DOLs)
• Evidence of continuing professional development
• Knowledge of disorders/ complexities prevalent acute mental health care

Desirable

• Management and leadership experience
• Teaching experience
• Experience in service development
• Experience of working in an inpatient setting
• Diagnostic reasoning
• Knowledge of research/audit processes and application in practice
• Management of patients with complex needs

Qualifications
Essential

• Clinical assessment and formulation skills in acute mental health practice
• Ability to produce mental health reports e.g. MHA Tribunal reports
• Highly developed communication, influencing and negotiating skills
• Ability to prioritise and meet deadlines
• Ability to use initiative and make decisions.
• Organisational and presentation skills
• Knowledge of clinical governance processes and how they underpin care delivery
• Knowledge of national and local NHS healthcare agenda and its implications
• Knowledge of mental health legislation (MHA, MCA/DOLs)
• Evidence of continuing professional development
• Knowledge of disorders/ complexities prevalent acute mental health care
• Professionally functions within a professional accountability framework

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.

UK Registration
Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).