Senior Mental Health Practitioner

Job overview

We are the South Cambridge Crisis Resolution and Home Treatment Team (CRHTT), providing 24/7 care for service users experiencing an acute mental health crisis, to support them to stay in their own home rather than being admitted to hospital. We are based in Cambridgeshire.

We are looking for Senior Mental Health Practitioners to join our team. Whether you are a Mental Health Nurse, Occupational Therapist or Social Worker we have an opportunity for you in our team.  We are a true MDT and no profession’s voice is louder than another’s.

These roles provide fantastic learning and development opportunities. You will gain experience working with service users with a wide range of presentations and diagnoses. Additionally, you’ll develop your risk assessment skills, crisis management, assessment skills and delivery of brief psychological interventions.

You will have the opportunity to work with a wide range of clinicians who will support you to develop your skills and understanding of mental illness. We are eager for our staff to develop professionally and have previously supported people to do their non-medical prescribing training, AMHP training and to train in psychological therapies.

Main duties of the job

As a Senior Mental Health Practitioner, you will be working within our multidisciplinary team to contribute to our provision of dynamic solution focussed care. In the Crisis Team we value the different perspectives brought by each of our colleagues. We work with service users experiencing an acute episode of mental illness, so it is vital that we work collaboratively to co-develop a plan to support our service users and their families.

You will be visiting service users in their own home to complete assessments. You will work with the MDT to plan and deliver interventions and work with other supporting services where appropriate.

Another significant part of the role is the management of the inpatient beds. We work on a rota to support the management of the inpatient beds. This is a critical role to ensure that the bed flow is supported and pro-actively managed and requires problem solving and decision-making skills.

Other benefits from joining us are:

• Annual leave allowance 27 days plus bank holidays (depending on NHS service)
• Pension scheme
• Full-time/Part-time or job share opportunities
• Salary sacrifice scheme
• Staff discount scheme
• Professional leadership programs for experienced nurses through NHS Academy
• Stress awareness training
• Mindfulness training
• Counselling service

As a Senior Mental Health Practitioner, you will be working within our multidisciplinary team to contribute to our provision of dynamic solution focussed care. In the Crisis Team we value the different perspectives brought by each of our colleagues. We work with service users experiencing an acute episode of mental illness, so it is vital that we work collaboratively to co-develop a plan to support our service users and their families.

You will be visiting service users in their own home to complete assessments. You will work with the MDT to plan and deliver interventions and work with other supporting services where appropriate.

Another significant part of the role is the management of the inpatient beds. We work on a rota to support the management of the inpatient beds. This is a critical role to ensure that the bed flow is supported and pro-actively managed and requires problem solving and decision-making skills.

Other benefits from joining us are:

• Annual leave allowance 27 days plus bank holidays (depending on NHS service)
• Pension scheme
• Full-time/Part-time or job share opportunities
• Salary sacrifice scheme
• Staff discount scheme
• Professional leadership programs for experienced nurses through NHS Academy
• Stress awareness training
• Mindfulness training
• Counselling service

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Please note for this role you will be required to travel independently around the county meeting strict time deadlines. You will need to hold a full UK driving licence* and have use of a vehicle. You cannot use public transport for this role as this is not a reliable form of transport and will not allow you to meet service needs. Please confirm in your application that you meet the specified criteria.

Please refer to the attached job description and person specification for full details of responsibilities.

• Screen referrals to the service and prioritise referrals effectively and safely
• Provide holistic psychosocial assessment, and subsequent planning and implementation of individual packages of care and treatment.
• Undertake clinical risk assessments, based on latest empirical evidence and compliant with local policies and procedures.
• Undertake risk management; practising safely and according to individual service user needs.
• Provide evidence based clinical interventions, making autonomous clinical decisions about own professional practice.
• Responsibility for the development, planning and implementation of brief care and treatment interventions for individual patients.
• Ensure that individual episodes of care are delivered in a timely, effective and integrated manner.
• Promote a recovery model that empowers patients, carers and relatives to be at the forefront of decision making and ownership of their packages of care and treatment.
• Act as the patients and relatives advocate.
• Enable patients and carers to manage disability, loss and change.
• To provide support, information and education to family members, carers and other professionals
• To liaise effectively with referrers and professionals within CPFT, promoting good working relationships and continuity of clinical care
• To supervise junior staff as required
• To act as a role model and clinically expert practitioner within the service
• Participate as an active member of the multi-disciplinary team, accountable for your practice, and work in partnership with other health care professionals, service users and others in the delivery of care.
• Champion patients’ rights, including: dignity, equality, diversity, choice and respect.
• Be conversant and proactive with Government legislation pertaining to the Mental Health Act, CPA, National Service Framework, NHS Plan and Clinical Governance.
• Represent the Crisis Resolution and Home Treatment Team at meetings.
• When undertaking all of the above ensure good documentation is provided and entered within the appropriate systems of record sharing.
• Participate in the team’s support and training of students

The post will include flexible working patterns over a 37.5 working hours per week to incorporate cover for 24 hours, 7-day service, including on call if required to meet the needs of the service users & carers.

*DVLA have a number of reciprocal arrangements with overseas countries, for further information please visit the DVLA website