Job Summary
The postholder will work as a member of the multidisciplinary team in the North Middlesex Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Paediatric Liaison Team (CAPPLT).

The postholder will provide a mixture of general paediatric work, alongside specific input for children with sickle cell disease and their families. They will be responsible for providing specialist clinical psychology input to the sickle cell and thalassemia service. This will include providing psychological assessments, cognitive assessments and therapeutic treatment within a multidisciplinary service, offering advice and consultation on patients' psychological care to parents, families, groups, paediatric, and other hospital staff, and consultation to other disciplines and professional networks, including staff from outside the hospital.

The postholder will receive clinical psychology supervision from a senior member of the Clinical Psychology discipline and will be responsible and accountable to the North Middlesex Head of Paediatric Liaison Psychological Therapies. The postholder will work autonomously within professional guidelines and within the overall framework of the Paediatric services policies and procedures.

The Post holder will be informed by evidence-based practice and participate in audit, policy and service development and research within the area served by the paediatric liaison team.

Main duties of the job

• To provide a specialist clinical psychology service to the sickle cell and thalassemia service within the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Paediatric Liaison team in accordance with objectives agreed with the line manager.
• To provide specialist psychological assessments of referred infants and their carers, children and adolescents, parents and carers with sickle cell disease and other physical health conditions to assess the most appropriate treatment for them in co-operation with other members of the multidisciplinary team.
• To provide specialist psychological assessments of patients referred to the team 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 patients' family members and others involved in the patient's care.
• To formulate and implement plans for psychological interventions including treatment and/or management of a patient's psychological problems, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the patient's problems, and employing methods based upon evidence of efficacy.
• To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment, treatment and discharge of patients whose problems are managed by psychologically based standard care plans.

About us
The Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Paediatric Liaison Team (CAPPLT) is a multidisciplinary team and is a service held within the wider Babies, Children's, & Young People Service (BCYP).

The team works with all areas of the paediatric and neonatal service, and this includes the T2 Rainbow Ward, Neonatal Unit, Children's Outpatients, Children's Community Nursing & Hospital@Home teams, Paediatric ED and Paediatric Assessment Unit, and the Ocean Day Unit.

The team also takes referrals from Midwifery and other hospital departments. This post has been funded specifically to work within the sickle cell service, and the majority of the post will be in this area with additional generic work dependent on the interest of the post holder.

The hospital is located on the border between Haringey and Enfield, at the most deprived part of each of these Boroughs. Both of these boroughs are two of the most ethnically diverse local authorities in the country and have some very high levels of social and economic deprivation and need with its attendant problems in Mental Health.

This role will involve clinical contact within the paediatric hospital environment with frequent exposure to very distressing situations. There is also potential exposure to infection in out and in-patient settings and a requirement to follow all related IPC processes and procedures.

Job responsibilities

• To assess and evaluate information from the child, family and significant others, multi-disciplinary medical team and external agencies relating to medical condition and developmental status and incorporate this information into a clinical formulation.
• To participate and collaborate with other team members in the provision of specialist paediatric clinics within the Paediatric service.
• To provide specialist psychological advice guidance and consultation to other professionals contributing directly to patients formulation, diagnosis and treatment plan.
• To contribute directly and indirectly to a psychologically based framework of understanding and care to the benefit of all patients of the service, across all settings and agencies serving the patient group.
• To undertake risk assessment and risk management for individual patients and to provide advice to other professions on psychological aspects of risk assessment and risk management.
• To act as care coordinator, where appropriate, taking responsibility for initiating planning and review of psychological care plans including patients, their carers, referring agents and others involved in the network of care.
• To communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner, information concerning the assessment, formulation and treatment plans of patients under their care and to monitor progress during the course of both uni- and multi-disciplinary care.
• To provide specialist psychological advice and support to facilitate the effective and appropriate provision of psychological care by all members of the treatment team.

Person Specification
Royal Free World Class Values
Essential

• Demonstrable ability to meet the Trust Values

Education & professional Qualifications
Essential

• Doctoral level training in clinical psychology, including specifically models of psychopathology, clinical psychometrics and neuropsychology, two or more distinct psychological therapies and lifespan developmental psychology, as accredited by the BPS.
• Appropriate registration with the HCPC or eligibility to register in the next 3 month
• Training in the use and interpretation of neuropsychological assessments with children.

Desirable

• Relevant core profession within Health and Social Care and education profession
• Pre-qualification training and qualifications in research methodology, staff training and/or other fields of applied psychology
• Masters level or equivalent therapeutic training relevant to the post.

Experience
Essential

• Experience of working with a wide variety of children, adolescents and their parents across a whole age range of presenting problems that reflect the full range of clinical severity
• Ability to work as a member of a multidisciplinary team located in the community or health care setting
• Experience of the application of therapy in different cultural contexts
• Experienced in oral presentations, working with people in groups
• Experience of specialist psychological and cognitive assessment and treatment of clients across the full range of care settings.

Desirable

• High level knowledge of the theory and practice of short and long term therapeutic interventions with individuals and families and its application to Eating Disorders
• Experience of working in Paediatric Liaison within a hospital inpatient and outpatient setting
• Skills in the use of complex methods of systemic assessment, intervention and management
• Experience of working with patients living with sickle cell disease
• Experience of eating disorders specialist systemic assessment and treatment for referred clients and their families

Knowledge
Essential

• Knowledge of legislation in relation to children and adolescents including Safeguarding Children and Vulnerable Adults Policies and Procedures
• Well developed skills in the ability to communicate effectively, orally and in writing, complex, highly technical and/or clinically sensitive information to patients, their families, carers and other professional colleagues both within and outside the NHS. This would involve using easy to understand language to convey systemic ideas and assumptions
• Interest in understanding the experience of living with sickle cell disease - physically, emotionally, socially and systemically.
• Knowledge of legislation in relation to children and adolescents including child protection procedures and policies.
• Knowledge of NHS, social care and education structures, national policies and frameworks.
• Doctoral level knowledge of research methodology, research design and complex, multivariate data analysis as practices within the clinical fields of psychology.

Desirable

• Knowledge of the theory and practice of specialised psychological therapies in specific difficult to treat groups (e.g. complex cases in specialist paediatrics).
• Skills in systemic family therapy

Others
Essential

• Basic IT skills including word processing, use of email and internet

Personal qualities
Essential

• Enthusiastic and motivated.
• Good interpersonal skills.
• Professional approach to work
• Accountability - Takes responsibility for own actions and promotes good team working
• Openness - Shares information and good practice appropriately.
• Mutual respect - Treats others with courtesy and respect.

Skills and abilities
Essential

• Skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration
• An 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 nonprofessional groups, ideally within a physical health settin
• Ability to tolerate anxiety without recourse to premature action whilst appreciating the role of the supervisor

Desirable

• Ability to teach and train others, using a variety of complex multimedia materials suitable for presentations within public, professional and academic settings
• Ability 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.

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: Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust
Address: North Middlesex Hospital, 1 Sterling Way, London, N18 1QX, United Kingdom
Employer's website: https://www.royalfreelondonjobs.co.uk/ (Opens in a new tab)

Employer contact details
For questions about the job, contact:
Consultant child & adolescent psychoanalytic
Andrea Pedraz
andrea.pedraz@nhs.net
(Date posted: 16 July 2026)