Co-Lead Psychologist for Early Intervention Services

Job overview

We are looking for a Clinical/Counselling psychologist with experience of working with psychosis to act as pathway lead alongside the existing lead for Early Intervention in Psychosis psychology and psychotherapy services. You will be based clinically in Merton Early Intervention service, Wilson Hospital in Mitcham, South West London, providing individual and family interventions to service users. You will offer supervision and leadership to qualified and trainee psychologists, CBT therapists and family intervention therapists across the SWLSTG trust early intervention services covering Wandsworth, Sutton, Merton, Kingston and Richmond and develop innovations and promote access to talking therapies across these services.

We are preparing to implement the trust’s community transformation plans in line with the Community Mental Health Framework, to improve access and provision for clients with severe mental health difficulties. In doing so we will be strengthening relationships with primary care and developing new links with the voluntary sector. The trust also provides regular CPD covering a wide range of clinical topics and opportunities for individual and specialist group supervision to support your development. In particular, our Early Intervention therapy provision has expanded over the last few years, and each team now has a strong team of therapists who can offer a range of therapies including Family Interventions, CBT for psychosis and EMDR.

Main duties of the job

The successful applicant will be committed to MDT working and to advancing trauma informed care and anti-racist practise across the pathway. You will contribute to and supervise the delivery of high quality evidence-based psychological therapies for people who have experienced a first episode of psychosis and their families. The role is dynamic and will require you to attend multidisciplinary meetings and to offer supervision, consultation, and training to clinicians within the wider MDT team. You will utilise your research skills for audit, policy and service development and research within the area served by the team/service.

There is a significant leadership component to the role and alongside the co-lead you will be overseeing a large team of psychologists, CBT therapists and family intervention therapists based in the different boroughs, contributing to job and service planning, recruitment, supervision and service development.

Agile and flexible working:

As one of the few Trusts in London we are proud to offer flexible and agile working as part of our new ways of working, and we are happy to talk flexible working at the interview stage.

The Trust is committed to supporting flexible working, including a blended approach of on-site and home working.  We will consider job shares/part time working requests.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

1. To provide specialist psychological assessments of clients referred to their clinical team based upon the appropriate use, interpretation and integration of complex psychological 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 clients, family members and others involved in the client’s care.

2. To formulate and implement plans for the formal psychological treatment and/or management of a client’s mental health problems, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the client’s problems, and employing methods of proven efficacy, across the full range of care settings.

3. To be responsible for implementing a range of psychological interventions for individuals, carers, families and groups, within and across teams employed individually and in synthesis, adjusting and refining psychological formulations drawing upon different explanatory models and maintaining a number of provisional hypotheses.

4. 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.

5. To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment, treatment and discharge of clients whose problems are managed by psychologically based standard care plans.

6. To provide specialist psychological advice, guidance and consultation to other professionals contributing directly to clients’ formulation, diagnosis and treatment plan.

7. To ensure that all members of the treating team have access to a psychologically based framework for understanding and care of clients of the service, through the provision of advice and consultation and the dissemination of psychological research and theory.

8. To undertake risk assessment and risk management for individual clients and to provide general advice to other professionals on psychological aspects of risk assessment and management.

9. To act as care coordinator, ensuring the provision of a care package appropriate for the clients needs, coordinating the work of others involved with care, tasking responsibility for arranging CPA reviews as required and communicating effectively with the client, his/her family and all others involved in the network of care, and to monitor progress during the course of multi-disciplinary interventions.

10. To communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner, information concerning the assessment, formulation and treatment plans of clients under their care and to monitor and evaluate progress during the course of both uni- and multi-disciplinary care.