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Job overview

The Trust is seeking to recruit a full-time Consultant Forensic Psychiatrist based at Rathbone Low Secure Unit in Liverpool.  The service has 32 male beds across two wards and provides assessment and management for patients from North and South Liverpool, South Sefton (up to Southport) and part of Kirkby. The population covered is approximately 1/3 million. The service provides low secure forensic care for detained patients with a mental disorder who present a significant risk of harm to others and cannot be managed in a non-secure environment.  The service forms part of the secure services pathway within Mersey Care.

The vacancy is an established permanent post which has arisen due to retirement.   The post holder will join a comprehensive MDT with good trainee medical support including a full-time substantive staff grade doctor and core trainee. There is also a full-time substantive Physician Associate. They will manage a caseload of 16 male inpatients and will maintain responsibility for the patient throughout his journey through the unit.  There is a second substantive consultant who has responsibility for the other inpatients.

The post currently attracts a 10% R&R payment which will be reviewed in 2025.

Main duties of the job

The post holder will act as Responsible Clinician within a multidisciplinary team. They will lead on the management of a caseload of 16 male inpatients.  This will include preadmission planning, MDT meetings, CPA reviews and discharge planning.  The post will require liaison with other agencies, including the Ministry of Justice, police, probation, social care and other mental health services.  They will exercise statutory responsibilities for patients detained under Restriction Orders, including completing statutory reports to the Ministry of Justice. For both non-restricted and restricted patients under their care they will be responsible for providing reports regarding Consent to Treatment and providing reports to, and attending, Tribunals and Managers’ Reviews.

The post holder will lead on the assessment of individuals referred for admission from a variety of sources including other secure services, general adult services, courts or prisons. .  These are discussed at the weekly referral meeting.  The postholder will participate in the panel meetings which are also held weekly and review referrals for admission to low secure and forensic step-down beds across the Merseyside and Cheshire region. 

The post holder will be expected to participate in the management of the service and attend clinical team meetings and other service-related meetings as appropriate. They will also provide supervision to the junior doctors and / or Physician Associate working in the service.

Working for our organisation

Mersey Care is one of the largest trusts providing physical health and mental health services in the North West, serving more than 1.4 million people across our region and are also commissioned for services that cover the North West, North Wales and the Midlands.

We offer specialist inpatient and community services that support physical and mental health and specialist inpatient mental health, learning disability, addiction and brain injury services. Mersey Care is one of only three trusts in the UK that offer high secure mental health facilities.

At the heart of all we do is our commitment to ‘perfect care’ – care that is safe, effective, positively experienced, timely, equitable and efficient. We support our staff to do the best job they can and work alongside service users, their families, and carers to design and develop future services together. We’re currently delivering a programme of organisational and service transformation to significantly improve the quality of the services we provide and safely reduce cost as we do so.

Flexible working requests will be considered for all roles.