Occupational Therapist

Job overview

Are you looking for your first Band 6 post, or have transferable skills but no community experience? Do you want to use OT core skills regularly in your work?  Then do consider coming to work with us in Croydon Community Mental Health services .

The Croydon Neighbourhood Teams cover working age adults aged 18-65 and a mixture of mental health conditions needing secondary care level community support.

The Occupational Therapist role is a core skills-based role . It carries a caseload of clients to which they provide OT assessment and bespoke OT therapeutic individual and group interventions. The OT works alongside Care Co-ordinators and other MDT practitioners to support needs led care planning (using Dialogue), and providing a comprehensive range of interventions to support recovery.

Each team has one OT but there is plenty of peer support and supervision to allow for career progression, skills development and professional support across the OT  service.

The OTs also link with inpatient and HTT OT colleagues and liaise with external providers in the voluntary and social care sector to ensure smooth transition of service users into and out of the Community Service.

There is an established SLaM Croydon Community OT network and regular monthly Peer Group. OT supervision will also be provided to support the development of these roles. There is also the opportunity to link in with the wider OT network within SLaM and all it has to offer including regular training and CPD.

Main duties of the job

To provide Occupational Therapy specialist assessments and interventions to a caseload of service users through group and individual interventions. These need to be appropriate to the Service Users identified needs and risks. Service users may have a wide range of intervention needs including mental health, physical health, sensory and environmental and occupational needs.

Applicants need to have sound clinical skills and good organisational skills. To be able to prioritise and work with service users  in both short and longer term timescales. They need to demonstrate excellent communication skills and be able to work effectively in a Multidisciplinary team and also engage with family and carers who are supporting the Service user.

The teams are busy so applicants need to demonstrate good clinical rational and decision making to ensure throughput and safe discharges from the OT caseload.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

To manage a caseload of community clients with complex needs, using evidence based and client-centred principles to assess, plan, implement and evaluate OT interventions in both community and home settings. Routinely provide recovery-based group interventions appropriate to the clients on the team caseload in collaboration with other professionals in the team.

Liaise with Croydon Social Services departments and other external agencies to facilitate clients access to activities and resources to support their physical disabilities, social support, occupational needs and discharge planning.

Work as part of the Multidisciplinary Team. Support Care Co-ordinator’s with appropriate work to contribute towards Care Act Assessment and CPA activities. Carry out some generic and risk assessments and undertake Team duty responsibilities.

Provide leadership, supervision and appraisal for OT students and junior OT staff and participate in the planning, development and evaluation of OT / MDT services, holding responsibility for defined projects and activities.