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Detailed job description and main responsibilities

MAIN TASKS AND RESPONSIBILITIES:

Patient Care

1.    To provide generic mental health and specialist psychotherapeutic assessments of children, adolescents and their families/carers referred to the team drawing on a variety of sources including psychological, self-report measures, rating scales, direct and indirect structured observations and semi-structured interviews with clients, family members and others involved in the client’s care.

2.    To formulate and implement plans for the treatment and/or management of a the child, young person and their families mental health problems, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of the presenting problem(s), and employing methods of proven efficacy, across the full range of care settings, in consultation with the MDT.

3.    In consultation with the Senior Management Team, to be responsible for implementing a range of psychotherapeutic model driven interventions for children, young people, their families/carers, within and across teams employed individually and in synthesis, adjusting and refining formulations drawing upon different explanatory models and maintaining a number of provisional hypotheses.

4.    To provide assessment and discharge care planning to children and young people who present for assessment in the acute NHS hospital, as part of a local protocol and rota.

5.    To evaluate and make decisions about treatment options taking into account both theoretical and therapeutic models and highly complex factors concerning historical and developmental processes that have shaped the individual child/young person, family or group.

6.    To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the assessment, treatment and discharge of children, young people and families whose problems are managed by psychologically based standard care plans.

7.    To provide specialist advice from the system model, guidance and consultation to other professionals contributing directly to formulation, diagnosis and treatment plan.

8.    To ensure that all members of the multi-disciplinary team have access to a therapeutically based framework for understanding the care needs of children, young people and their families from a psychotherapeutic perspective, through the provision of advice and consultation and the dissemination of psychological research and theory and specifically from the perspective of the psychotherapeutic model.

9.    To undertake risk assessment and risk management for individual children, young people and their families and to provide general advice to other professionals regarding risk assessment and management.

10. To communicate complex and potentially highly contentious information in a highly skilled and sensitive manner, in situations with children, young people and their families/carers who may be extremely hostile or highly emotional, requiring the highest level of communication skills. To communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner, information concerning the assessment, formulation and treatment plans of clients under their care and to monitor and evaluate progress during the course of both uni- and multi-disciplinary care.

11. To provide expertise, advice and support to facilitate the effective and appropriate provision of care by all members of the treatment team with a special focus on psychotherapeutic interventions.

Teaching, training and supervision

1.    To use a broad theoretical knowledge base and specialist clinical skills to train, support and supervise where appropriate, members of the MDT team in principles of psychotherapeutic interventions/ therapy.

2.    To provide advice, consultation and training and clinical supervision to other members of the team for their provision of psychotherapeutically based interventions to help improve the functioning of children, young people and their families/carers.

3.    To maintain and develop skills in the area of professional pre- and post-graduate training and clinical supervision.

4.    To develop and maintain knowledge of local resources and develop working relationships with relevant statutory, voluntary and community groups and organisations providing care and support for children, young people and their families.

5.    To lead on the professional training relationships with other organisations for their discipline and be responsible for the successful placement of trainees within BEH Barnet CAMHS.

People (HR) Management

1.    To participate as a senior clinician in the development of a high quality, responsive and accessible service including advising both service and professional management on those aspects of the service where clinical and/or organisational matters need addressing.

2.    To provide senior clinical oversight, in collaboration with operational and administrative managers and the clinical team, of the borough CAMHS service single point of access.

3.    To exercise delegated responsibility for managing psychotherapeutic therapies resources available to the borough CAMHS team, including psychotherapeutic therapy trainees/ honorary staff providing psychotherapeutically driven interventions as part of a training course.

4.    To exercise responsibility for the clinical governance of psychotherapeutic therapies practice within the service/team in collaboration with the Service Management team.

5.    To participate as appropriate in the process of staff recruitment with a  focus on but not exclusively psychotherapeutic therapists.  

Information Management.

1.    To use computers to write reports and record data, including the use of statistical packages as part of psychological testing, research and assessment when needed. To be able to use research databases and advanced tools for analysis at both quantitative and qualitative levels.

2.    To adhere to the practice of data collection and analysis by using agreed outcome measures and ensuring the discipline performs according to agreed outcomes.

Policy Development. 

1.    To ensure the development, maintenance and dissemination of the highest professional standards of practice, through active participation in internal and external CPD training and development programmes.

2.    To ensure the development and articulation of best practice in psychotherapeutic therapies provision within the borough based CAMHS service and contribute across the service by exercising the skills of a reflexive and reflective scientist practitioner, taking part in regular professional supervision and appraisal and maintaining an active engagement with current developments in the field of psychotherapeutic therapies and related disciplines.

3.    To maintain and disseminate the highest standards of clinical record keeping including electronic data entry and recording, report writing, in line with Trust and national data protection and record keeping requirements and policies, and the responsible exercise of professional self-governance in accordance with professional codes of practice of the relevant professional registration body.

4.    To maintain up to date knowledge of legislation, national and local policies and issues in relation to both children, young people and their families/carers and mental health in general.

Service Development

1.    To participate, as a senior clinician, in the evaluation, monitoring and development of the team’s operational policies, through the deployment of professional skills in research, service evaluation and audit and ensuring incorporation of psychotherapeutic frameworks for understanding and provision of high quality care.

2.    To utilise theory, evidence-based literature and research to support evidence based practice in individual work and work with other team members.

3.    To maintain an interest in research of benefit to child mental health and provide advice and encouragement to those within the service undertaking such research.

4.    To initiate project management, including complex audit and service evaluation, with colleagues within and across the service to help develop and improve services to clients and their families, in consultation with the management team.