The Clinical Health Psychology team are embedded at the
interface of physical and mental health, and work in a truly bio-psycho-social
way to alleviate the distress experienced by those with physical health
conditions. The appreciation and valuing of psychology and psychological
therapies by the renal team has been demonstrated by their willingness to fund
an additional psychology post to work alongside our established senior
psychologist who will supervise and support this role. We are now looking
for a practitioner psychologist or psychological therapist to work with people
who are living with kidney disease. The work is a varied and interesting mix of
direct client work and indirect work providing via support and training to the
medical staff who work in this area. Psychology staff also work to create a
trauma-informed environment within the renal team and can help advocate for
patients. There are elements to this role, such as working
towards completing donor and recipient transplant assessments and some end of
life treatment decision making, which may not be so prevalent in other roles,
which offers the opportunity to develop specialist competencies. There is some
flexibility in working hours and modalities within service constraints.
We welcome applications from both psychologists and other
therapists e.g. psychotherapists, family therapists, and from current doctoral
trainees who are due to complete their qualifications this academic year.
All clinical health psychology staff belong in two teams; the hospital team that they link with and the psychology team they sit in. We are part of DPTs wider strategy of Integrated Psychological Medicine, and have strong links with Talking Health and Liaison Psychiatry. As a service we have been able to offer a wide range of training, clinical and development opportunities. We support our staff to develop their careers and have been very successful in recent years in supporting staff to train in specific therapy models.
We provide mental health, learning disability and neurodiversity services, as well as a range of specialist & secure services for the wider south west region & nationally. We are passionate about promoting good mental health & wellbeing. We strive to use the expertise & resources within our organisation, and through our partnerships, to deliver high quality services that are safe & focused on people's recovery.
We are committed to developing a culture of coproduction, involving patients, families & carers in everything we do
We not only recruit based on qualifications & experience - we recruit individuals who possess & demonstrate the behaviours which underpin our Trusts core values. These include such attributes as showing a commitment to quality of care, improving lives of others, giving respect, dignity & compassion. We can bring those values to life in our everyday tasks by giving a smile; making time for people; challenging ourselves & others, & being open to new ideas.
We are committed to being an inclusive employer & applications are encouraged & welcomed from all sections of the community, regardless of any protected characteristics as governed by the Equality Act 2010. Part time & flexible working applications will be considered & supported, where possible. We particularly encourage applicants with lived experience of mental health conditions, neurodiversity or learning disabilities. We are a Disability Confident Leader.
Job description
Job responsibilities
Job Purpose
The principle purpose of the job is to
improve the psychological health & wellbeing of people who attend Renal
Services at the Royal Devon University Hospital (RDUH).
This will be achieved in this post by:
1. Supporting the systematic provision of a
high quality psychological service in specialist fields of practice, across
identified locality area, as a key component of integrated mental/physical
health and wellbeing services across Devon Partnership NHS Trust and the Acute
Trust.
2. To carry out specialist psychological
assessments with donors and recipients with regard to kidney transplants.
3.
Carrying a specialist caseload of clients for assessment and intervention,
and providing advice and consultancy to patients, family members, carers and
professionals.
4.
The post holder will be supported by the Principal Clinical Psychologist
within the Renal service and the wider Clinical Health and Neuropsychology Service.
The post holder will be expected to make good use of the expertise of others
within the service to further develop their clinical skills with this client
group
5.
To work autonomously within professional guidelines and support the
systematic governance of psychological practice within the health teams and
services they will work with.
6.
The post holder will receive regular professional and clinical
supervision in accordance to Trust policy and to Professional Practice
Guidelines set out by the British Psychological Society or appropriate
designated Professional Body
Duties and
Responsibilities
Communication and Working Relationship Skills
Clients,
family and carers: To communicate in a highly skilled and sensitive manner with
clients who may have specific difficulties in understand and/or communicating
and who may be hostile, antagonistic or highly emotionally disturbed.
Multidisciplinary
team colleagues: To work closely with colleagues from both Devon Partnership Trust
and the Acute Trust in the
multi-professional integrated mental health/physical health and wellbeing
service on a day to day basis
Health
& social care staff: To communicate with a wide range of health & social care staff
in hospital and in community settings in a highly skilled and sensitive
manner, complex and sensitive information concerning the assessment,
formulation and treatment plans of clients under the services care. To
provide support & guidance in the application of psychological principles
and techniques, and to foster reflective practice.
Senior
managers & professional staff: To maintain and build good working relationships
with senior professional staff and managers across the Trust and the Acute
Trust, to foster a positive approach to the integrated mental health and
wellbeing service and to enable effective negotiation.
Analytical and Judgemental Skills
To
provide specialist clinical/counselling psychology expertise and advice.
To
provide psychological therapies, developing specialist psychological
formulations and assessments of clients, formulating plans for their
psychological treatment and implementing specialist psychological
interventions for individuals, carers, families and groups. Proficiency in in
both individual and group therapy approaches is desirable.
To support the Professional Head, General Manager, Practice and
Strategic Development Leads and Professional Leads by undertaking service
development and redesign projects and coordinating the resulting work within
the team.
To provide complex assessment of specialist
conditions
Planning and Organisational Skills
The psychology service: To plan and organise own work within the service setting
and to contribute to the development and improvement of provision of
psychological services within the commissioned integrated mental health and
wellbeing service to best meet the organisations strategy and priorities.
The multidisciplinary service: To provide psychology/therapy supervision
to the multi-professional planning, development and marketing of mental
health and wellbeing services
Responsibility for Patient/Client
Care, Treatment and Therapy
Assessment & intervention: To provide expert psychological
therapies, developing specialist psychological formulations and assessments
of clients, formulating plans for their psychological treatment and
implementing specialist psychological interventions for individuals, carers,
families and groups, and to demonstrate awareness of diversity issues.
Consultation & guidance: To provide advice, guidance and
consultation on psychological aspects of patient care to colleagues, other
service providers, patients, supporters and families
Responsibility for Policy and Service Development
Implementation
The post holder is accountable for their own professional
actions, acting within Trust policies and procedures and Professional
Practice Guidelines.
Policy & service: To support policies and procedures for the provision of
psychology and therapy services within own service and other services within
the Trust.
R & D: To support the R&D activities of the clinical health
psychology and neuropsychology service.
Responsibility for Finance, Equipment and
Other Resources
To be responsible for the safe keeping of equipment under
own use.
Responsibility for Human
Resources, e.g. Supervision, Training, HR Advice and Management
Leadership & supervision: To professionally supervise less
experienced psychology/therapy staff, trainees and volunteers.
To provide placement responsibilities for trainee staff.
To contribute to the provision of therapy supervision for non-psychology/therapy
staff providing psychological therapies within other Trust teams.
To support placements for trainee staff in line with
professional guidelines
Responsibility for Information Resources and
Administrative Duties
To maintain accurate records, compliant with Trust
Practice Standards.
To be responsible for using an email account to generate,
monitor, and respond to the e-mail traffic by which the Trust conducts much
of its internal communication.
Responsibility for Research and Development
To
utilise theory, evidence-based literature and research to support evidence
based practice in individual work within the individual work within the CHNP
service and local integrated psychological medicine services.
To
conduct project work including specific areas of audit, research or service
evaluation
As a clinician to be responsible for
collecting clinical practice and outcome data that contributes to building
practice based evidence and service evaluation.
