Play Youth Worker

Job overview

The Youth Worker is an integral member of the Play Service and will work very closely with the Play Service manager and Deputy Health Play Specialist manager.

The youth worker will work within the Play Service team delivering professional youth work supporting the Trust adolescent strategy and specific identified aims, objectives and outcomes and work closely with other Youth work colleagues to develop the services for adolescents.

The other roles include

• To encourage and to develop a peer group network of support for teenagers
• To develop and run a wide range of age-appropriate recreational activities both online and face to face to enable young people aged 11-21 years to develop cognitive, social and emotional skills to help prepare them for the move to Adult Services
• To participate in the multi-disciplinary team using specific skills to contribute to the care and understanding of the young people, their families and carers.
• To ensure the clinic environment is young person friendly and meets their needs.
• The Youth Worker and Play Service Manger are jointly responsible for ensuring competency, therefore be specific to the specialty, clinical area or patient group

Main duties of the job

• Create and maintain relationships with patients, parent/carers, offering advice and support where necessary.
• Accompany patients to other areas of the hospital for specialised treatment.
• Direct supervision using experience and knowledge to ensure patients attend transition clinics and encourage early communication if unable to attend.
• Working alongside the young people, use informal or formal assessment to establish the needs of this patient group.
• Using these results, work closely with the healthcare team in establishing an appropriate response to support these young people throughout the service.
• To provide and lead recreational facilities and youth work activities for young people at Alder Hey Children’s foundation hospital.
• Encourage and supervise the interaction of young people with activities, with particular emphasis on group work and using motivational approaches, where appropriate.
• To devise and develop ways in which a peer group support can be achieved.
• Work with young people to prepare them for specific activities, treatment plans and transition to adult services.
• To coordinate and supervise social support networks to encourage social interaction and support to young people in order to aid adjustment to diagnosis. Encourage peer support within this group.
• Provide active outreach to young people struggling to engage with health services

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

• To participate in fundraising processes, including suggestions for fundraisers, proposals of contributions to the service and accepting donations at charitable events.
• To keep accurate records of financial outgoings and donated income for charitable trust to be monitored throughout the year.
• Responsibility for ordering supplies and equipment as appropriate.
• To supervise unqualified staff such as youth work, play specialist students and volunteers. Contribute to a learning environment for students and provide mentoring when required.
• To coordinate creative and therapeutic activities and implement a range of strategies.
• Liaise with complementary therapies, music workshop, community and youth groups to contribute to these strategies
• To keep records of the numbers and types of patients receiving recreational services/input and to assess social and emotional capabilities before and after intervention.
• To attend unit meetings e.g. clinical governance, action log, staff support regularly. To participate in a range of multidisciplinary meetings both within the trust and outside agencies regularly.