Job summary
We are welcoming applications for the post of Advanced Psychological Practitioner, working in Mersey Care's Crisis Resolution Home Treatment Team (CRHT).

The post-holder will be an experienced psychological practitioner/psychological therapist with a recognised qualification in an area of psychological practice/therapy.

The postholder will work and be line managed within CRHT and will receive clinical supervision from the Mental Health Urgent Care Psychology Team, with whom they will work closely alongside. The focus of the role will be to provide psychological assessment, formulation, and intervention for patients in crisis, supporting the MHUC intervention pathways. There will also be opportunities to deliver training on psychological concepts, supervise others, and provide consultation for practitioners across MHUC.

Main duties of the job
The postholder will provide crisis-focused assessment, formulation, and brief intervention for patients currently under CRHT. They will also provide training, supervision, reflective practice, and consultation across MHUC to both non-psychology and psychology colleagues. They will be responsible for a clinical caseload and will receive regular clinical and management supervision.They will work alongside the CRHT multidisciplinary team, and will be required to work autonomously within professional guidelines and the overall framework of the service's policies and procedures. There will be opportunities to contribute to audit, service development and research within MHUC.

Training and development is key in both CRHT and the MHUC Psychology Team, with recent training accessed by staff including, CFT, reflective practice skills, CAT, and DBT skills.

About us
Mersey Care is one of the largest trusts providing physical health and mental health services in the North West, serving more than 1.4 million people across our region and are also commissioned for services that cover the North West, North Wales and the Midlands.

We offer specialist inpatient and community services that support physical and mental health and specialist inpatient mental health, learning disability, addiction and brain injury services. Mersey Care is one of only three trusts in the UK that offer high secure mental health facilities.

At the heart of all we do is our commitment to 'perfect care' - care that is safe, effective, positively experienced, timely, equitable and efficient. We support our staff to do the best job they can and work alongside service users, their families, and carers to design and develop future services together. We're currently delivering a programme of organisational and service transformation to significantly improve the quality of the services we provide and safely reduce cost as we do so.

Flexible working requests will be considered for all roles.

Job responsibilities
Clinical:

• To provide specialist psychological assessments of clients referred to the team 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 clients, family members and others involved in the service users care.
• To formulate and implement plans for the formal psychological treatment and/or management of a clients psychological problems, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the clients problems, and employing methods based upon evidence of efficacy.
• To be responsible for implementing psychologically informed interventions for individuals, possibly carers, families, and groups, within and across teams employed individually and in synthesis, adjusting and refining formulations.
• 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.
• To exercise autonomous professional responsibility within the MDT context, for the assessment, treatment and discharge of service user whose problems are managed by psychologically based standard care plans.
• To provide specialist psychologically informed advice, guidance and consultation to other professionals contributing directly to service user formulation, diagnosis and treatment plan.
• To contribute directly and indirectly to a psychologically based framework of understanding and care to the benefit of all service users of the service, across all settings and agencies serving the client group.
• To undertake risk assessment and risk management for individual clients and to provide advice to other professions on psychological aspects of risk assessment and risk management according to Mersey Care Trust policies and procedures.
• To communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner, information concerning the assessment, formulation and treatment plans of service users under their care and to monitor progress during the course of both uni- and multi-disciplinary care.
• To check understanding of information where there are often barriers to effective communications due to distress or psychiatric symptoms in service users or where there is resistance in staff. This may include situations where English is not the first language.
• To liaise with other professionals offering services within and outside of the service to ensure good communication and high standards of service user care. Where appropriate to job role take responsibility for the safe administration of medication to service users ensuring that the Trust policies and procedures and the Nursing & Midwifery Councils regulations are adhered to.
• To have accurate and up-to-date knowledge of the Mental Health Act / Mental Capacity Act and other relevant legislation.

Teaching, training, and supervision

• To receive regular clinical professional supervision from a practitioner psychologist and, where appropriate, other senior professional colleagues.
• To continue to gain wider post-qualification experience of psychological therapy over and above that provided within the principal service area where the postholder is employed.
• To develop skills in the area of professional post-graduate teaching, training and supervision and to provide supervision to other MDT staffs psychological work, as appropriate.
• Where appropriate to regularly provide professional and specialist psychological clinical supervision of individual and group-based cases for e.g., Assistant Psychologists
• To contribute to the pre- and post-qualification teaching of all relevant staff, as appropriate.
• To provide advice, consultation, supervision and training to staff working with the client group across a range of agencies and settings, where appropriate.

Management, recruitment, policy and service development:

• To contribute to the development, evaluation and monitoring of the teams operational policies and services, through the deployment of professional skills in research, service evaluation and audit including managing own referral system and reporting regularly on waiting times.
• To advise both service and professional management on those aspects of the service where psychological and/or organisational matters need addressing.
• To be involved, as appropriate, in the shortlisting and interviewing of junior staff.
• The post holder will be expected to make full use of IT packages available within the work area, for example, Microsoft office, email, internet and statistical packages.
• To provide leadership and management as required. This will include tasks such as management of attendance, annual leave and the use of Trust policies where required and appropriate.
• To use skills gained through qualification and experience to communicate with members of your team in the implementation of change and in the interest of good, cohesive team working.
• Supervise and monitor the clinical record entries made by staff under your management and/ or clinical supervision through performance management and audit.

Service Governance:

• To utilise theory, evidence-based literature, and research to support evidence-based practice in individual work and work with other team members.
• To undertake research and provide research advice to other staff undertaking research as appropriate.
• To undertake project management, including complex audit and service evaluation, with colleagues within the service to help develop service provision.
• To undertake a defined role in local division Service Governance structures as agreed.

General:

• To contribute to the development and maintenance of the highest professional standards of practice, through active participation in internal and external CPD training and development programmes, in consultation with the postholders professional and service manager(s) in line with the priorities of the service and PDP objectives and to provide evidence of CPD undertaken, e.g., in the form of CPD logbook.
• To contribute to the development and articulation of best practice in psychotherapy/psychology across the service.
• To maintain the highest standards of clinical record keeping including electronic data entry and recording, report writing and the responsible exercise of professional self-governance in accordance with professional codes of practice, other professional bodies and local division and Trust policies and procedures.
• To maintain up to date knowledge of legislation, national and local policies and issues in relation to mental health.
• To perform other duties of a similar kind appropriate to the grade, which may be required by their Head of service.
• To facilitate service user and carer involvement in the ongoing development and evaluation of the service.

Person Specification
Qualifications
Essential

• Evidence of post registration study.
• Appropriate professional qualification at degree level, by RMN AHP Social Worker
• Have or be working towards a specific postgraduate level (certificate/master's level) qualification in a psychological therapy
• Significant demonstrable post registration experience within mental health services

Desirable

• Masters level education in an area of psychological practice and/or a qualification in a specific psychotherapy.

Knowledge / Experience
Essential

• Experience of specialist psychological assessment, formulation and treatment of clients across the full range of care settings, including community, primary care and in patient settings.
• Experience of teaching, training and/or supervision.
• Experience of the application of psychological interventions in different cultural contexts
• Proven experience of leadership and management of clinical care within the community setting.
• Training and experience of delivering psychological Interventions for those with difficulties relating to complex trauma histories and those who are presenting with mental health crisis (such as Structured Clinical Management, PIT, EMDR, DBT)
• Experience of exercising full clinical responsibility for patients' psychological care and treatment, both as a professionally qualified key worker and also within the context of a multidisciplinary care plan and under supervision from senior clinical staff.
• Evidence of experience of managing cases & caseloads
• Evidence of supervising staff.
• Ability to work autonomously across the organisation/boundaries and with other agencies
• Experience of working in partnership with other agencies and service users and carers
• Experience of audit/research and working knowledge of clinical governance.
• Demonstrate knowledge in the concepts of mentorship, preceptorship and supervision and ability to provide education and supervision to junior staff
• Demonstrate a good knowledge of professional Codes of Conduct and Staffs' responsibility to identify gaps in their knowledge base.
• Expertise in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, formulation, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration.
• Well developed and effective communication skills, oral and written, to communicate 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.
• Good well-developed knowledge of research methodology and design.
• Knowledge of legislation in relation to the client group and mental health
• Knowledge of IT systems including word processing, email and local electronic patient information systems

Desirable

• Experience of delivering teaching/training in the area of consultation/formulation
• Appreciate the process of standard setting and audit
• Experience of working within mental health urgent care settings.

Skills
Essential

• Ability to teach and train others, using a variety of complex multi- media materials suitable for presentations within public, professional and academic settings.
• Ability to identify and employ mechanisms of service governance as appropriate, to support and maintain clinical practice in the face of regular exposure to highly emotive material and challenging behaviour.
• Ability to self-reflect, use clinical supervision appropriately and consider complex organisational and team dynamics
• To possess significant levels of personal resilience.
• To possess an understanding and appropriate levels of empathy to work effectively with clients presenting in mental health crisis
• Be able to maintain a high degree of professionalism in the face of highly emotive and distressing problems, verbal abuse and the threat of physical abuse.
• To possess an advanced understanding of own qualities and personality and how this influences relational dynamics with MHUC service users
• To be able to develop clinical practice and capabilities through engagement in clinical supervision
• Professional attitude.
• Possess excellent listening and negotiation skills and leadership skills.
• Excellent oral and written skills
• Excellent interpersonal and organisational skills.
• Ability to contribute to developing care excellence within the team area.

Other
Essential

• Ability and willingness to travel for work, to patients' homes and other work bases across the Mersey Care patch.

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.
Applicants must have current UK professional registration.