Mental Health Practitioner

Job overview

We are excited to be recruiting for a thoughtful, compassionate Mental Health Practitioner to join our committed and supportive multi-disciplinary team under the NHS Children and Young People Gender Service (South West) CYPGS SW.

It is provided by a large multi-disciplinary team (MDT). As part of this team, the Mental Health Practitioner will provide specialist assessments, and be part of the evolving evidence base for the field of gender care. All staff working in the CYPGS SW are very well supported through multi-disciplinary working, individual supervision, drop in case discussion, Academy of Royal Colleges specialist children’s and young people’s gender service training programme. There are weekly clinical development meetings. We value the provision of evidence-based care delivered by highly skilled compassionate clinicians.

Our service has purpose-built accommodation with high quality clinical space for face to face and remote appointments. We offer outreach clinics in Devon and Cardiff. The opportunity for hybrid working would make this post suitable for clinicians from outside the Bristol area.

CPD is highly valued in this team with weekly clinical development meetings, provided by clinicians within the team and external, to ensure high level clinical skill. In addition, we also provide team Away Days for team and service development and for more in depth clinical skills training. For example, we recently held and ACT training Day for all clinical staff.

Main duties of the job

• To offer clinical work consistent with the Cass Review and the 2026 Service Specification for CYP Gender Services.
• As part of a team provide psychological assessments and organised complex clinical information into a clear case formulation.
• To be able to analyse, synthesise and summarise large amounts of clinical information
• To be have therapy training (eg CBT, family therapy) to be able to support and deliver interventions for clients in the CYP Gender Service..
• To provide evidence based and culturally appropriate interventions with carers or families of referred clients when required.
• To assess and monitor risk and develop appropriate risk management plan in liaison with safeguarding and senior professionals.
• To take responsibility for initiating, planning, and reviewing care plans with CYP with low to medium complexity, including liaison with local services when required.
• To contribute to the effective working of the CYP Gender Service – South West and to a psychologically informed holistic care framework for the service.
• To contribute to the team or service’s delivery of accessible and acceptable services.
• To liaise with referrers, health, education, and social care professionals concerned with clients to develop and review care plans.

For more details, please refer to the attached JD.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

We have strong links to local and regional universities providing access to support research and clinical training with honorary appointment up to professorial level. Psychological Health Services has an expanding research portfolio and provide and support opportunities to develop this further.  Psychological Health Services take pride in their commitment to providing high quality and accessible CPD and access to skilled clinical and peer supervision. Examples of current CPD opportunities include monthly Trust wide departmental CPD meetings, journal clubs and an ACT supervision group. Our commitment to clinical excellence is reflected in our annual cycle of quality outcomes related to a wide portfolio of activity.

We work together to grow and shape the department; we have a notice board style central point of communication to keep you up to date communicating via surveys about what matters to us all. Membership of departmental Service Delivery Groups (SDGs) give the opportunity to broaden skills and experiences and be involved in wider psychology initiatives.

As a large department Psychological Health Services provides clinical psychology services to a wide range of specialist multidisciplinary teams. Although the current recruitment is for a specific post, we welcome applications and enquiries from those who are interested in wider opportunities within our portfolio. We have a commitment in Paediatrics to collaborate with our colleagues as much as we can. This means we regularly offer advice and guidance to patients outside of our core patient group. This rewarding work is highly appreciated by the Trust.

As a way to support individual development, growth of expertise and service priorities, staff can benefit from opportunities to work into other clinical areas through discussion and planning with their line manager and head of service.  This will be an element of the working lives of much of the staff group you would lead.

For a more detailed job description, main responsibilities, and person specification, please refer to the job description document attached to this vacancy.