Speech and Language Therapist

Job overview

Do you want to advocate for people with a learning disability to communicate and live well?

As a Speech and Language Therapist in the Community Learning Disability Team, you will use your clinical expertise and experience to support people with the most complex needs to live well with their learning disability. This is a Band 6 role, but it can be adapted to suit a more newly qualified Speech & Language Therapist at a Band 5, and preceptorship and appropriate training would be provided as required. You will provide specialist communication and dysphagia assessments and interventions for people referred to the service as well as being an integral member of a very friendly and supportive team of SaLT's and wider multi-disciplinary team.  You will have the autonomy to manage your own diary, and opportunities for hybrid working.  This post is a full-time post.

Please contact either the Team Leader or the Principal Speech and Language Therapist if you would like to discuss the role further.

Main duties of the job

Contributing to the management of a team caseload of individuals with complex needs, you will assess, plan, implement and evaluate interventions, which will be delivered in a variety of community settings. The team encourages multi-disciplinary working wherever possible and you will convene, facilitate, and contribute to meetings to develop a holistic understanding of the person and their needs.

• To manage a caseload of adults with learning disabilities who have complex communication difficulties and dysphagia / eating / drinking / swallowing difficulties.
• To promote and enable service user and carer involvement and choice in intervention options.
• To understand a clients’ learning capacity and to approach gaining informed consent in ways which demonstrate good practice and conform to Trust consent policies. To ensure that consent is approached within the legal framework for clients who may be deemed to lack capacity to consent to treatment.
• To undertake team Lead Practitioner role. This involves coordinating the care provided by the multidisciplinary team, organising and chairing meetings and updating clinical plans.
• To undertake comprehensive assessment of clients referred using investigative and analytic skills, to formulate an individualised management and treatment programme.
• To evaluate effectiveness of interventions using agreed outcome measures.

Please refer to the Job Description for more detail.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

The Speech & Language Therapist will be based within the West Sussex CTPLD, in the Northern Team (office base in Horsham) and will hold responsibility for managing a caseload in Northern West Sussex. This is a specialist Speech & Language Therapy post in the Community Team for People with a Learning Disability suited to a Speech & Language Therapist with a minimum of 2 years postgraduate Speech & Language Therapy experience. But, as stated above, we are also able to offer the post at Band 5 with a view to progressing to Band 6. Post-graduate dysphagia training will be provided if required, as will close support and supervision from more experienced Speech and Language Therapists and support from a Speech and Language Therapy Assistant.

The clinical role will be to provide Speech & Language Therapy assessment, diagnosis and intervention to clients referred to the service using established models of Speech & Language Therapy ensuring practice is evidence based. The postholder will work as a core member of the CTPLD.

Please refer to the Job Description for more detail.