Community Mental Health Nurse

Main area West Kent Directorate Grade Band 6

Contract Permanent

Hours Full time - 37.5 hours per week (shifts, days nights 7 days a week)

Job ref 380-WK0177-B

Site Priority House Town Maidstone

Salary £37,338 - £44,962 per annum

Salary period Yearly

Closing 07/04/2025 23:59

The CQC rates us as an Outstanding organisation for Caring with an overall rating of Good

Kent and Medway NHS and Social Care Partnership Trust (KMPT) offer a range of ongoing benefits to our valued workforce across the Trust. From an active health and wellbeing programme to regular recognition events, we work hard to provide varied benefits that make a difference to your work-life balance.

Would you like to work flexibly? In the NHS, we are reminded every day of how important life is. As a flexible working friendly organisation, we want to be sure that you can work in a way that is best for us, for our patients and for you.

Speak to us about how we might be able to accommodate a flexible working arrangement.

Job overview

To work as a member of the Crisis Resolution Home Treatment Team, working within the home treatment function delivering support to patients and their families using evidence based, profession specific and general mental health knowledge providing client centred, recovery orientated principles and practice for individuals, families and carers referred to the Service. You will also work within the Rapid response function undertaking assessments 24/7 received from Urgent Mental Health Helpline as well as undertaking gatekeeping assessments. To work in accordance with Trust and Crisis Resolution Home Treatment Team Policies and Procedures and the Care Programme Approach. To provide an alternative to inpatient admission treating patients in their home environment who are presenting in a crisis with significant distress.

Main duties of the job

• Demonstrates ability to work as a team member as well as alone making autonomous decisions in a fast-paced environment.
• Supporting Band 7 to manage a case load of service users who have complex acute/crisis needs.
• Balancing all aspects of the job role.
• Being flexible and responsive to competing demands.

Working for our organisation

Come and work with us in the Garden of England where we combine exceptional professional development opportunities with a tremendous quality of life.

We are Kent and Medway NHS and Social Care Partnership Trust (KMPT), providing mental health, learning disability and specialist services, serving 1.8 million people in Kent and Medway, as well as specialist services for adults in Sussex and Surrey. We are rated Good overall by the CQC.

Each year we care for over 2,000 people in our hospitals and 54,000 people in the community.

We are proud to employ over 3,800 people from 66 nationalities, and to serve an increasingly diverse range of communities across rural and urban areas.

You will be joining friendly, passionate colleagues, rich in their diversity, who are committed to providing excellent care to our service users and their loved ones.

The nature of our work attracts kindness and compassion as standard and everyone from our cleaners and porters to the chief executive and chairman are recognised as playing a vital role in providing an exemplary service.

Our mission is what we set out to do every day We deliver brilliant care through brilliant people.

Our vision is where we want to be in the future To provide outstanding care and to work in partnership to deliver this in the right place, for every service user, every time.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

• Working with service users referred to Crisis Resolution and Home Treatment Service.
• To screen, and work with all newly referred service users experiencing acute mental health crisis providing assessment or short-term interventions until crisis is resolved.
• To provide short-term specific psychosocial interventions for those who would benefit from crisis interventions.
• To ensure documentation is reviewed and updated in line with quality improvement standards.
• To shift co-ordinate lead the shift, allocate work to the wider MDT and prioritise workloads.
• To contribute to the planning and implementation of induction, training and education of students and staff.
• To contribute to the delivery of specialist/ professional training packages of in-service training and staff development when necessary.
• To fulfil the role of mentor/practice educator, maintaining own update training and ensuring responsibility for regular placement provision and ensuring supervision and written assessment of students whilst on placement.
• To assist the band 7 senior practitioner by identifying personal and professional training needs in order to appropriately plan for future training and development.
• To provide effective supervision, support, and guidance for support /STR/ peer workers and any work delegated to them.
• Responsible for the delivery of individual care plans for a caseload.
• Expected to implement policies as directed by the trust/directorate for the department, ensuring awareness throughout the department.
• Participate in leading service developments.

Person specification

Training, Qualifications and Registration

• Registration with relevant regulatory body. The Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC).
• Further training relevant to the role.

Experience

• Experience working in mental health service.
• Experience of prioritising casework and allocation/delegation of tasks to others.
• Experience of liaising with a variety of stakeholders both internal and external to organisations.
• To be able to work a 24hr shift pattern including day shifts, nights shifts and weekend shifts.
• Experience working within Crisis Home Treatment Team.

Knowledge and Skills

• Knowledge of and ability to apply relevant legislative frameworks and policies relating to care e.g. Care programme approach, Mental Capacity Act, Safeguarding, Consent to Treatment.
• An understanding and ability to apply principles of risk assessment and risk management.
• Understanding of the impact of mental health crisis on lifestyle and function for clients, family and carers and common pharmacological and psychosocial treatments.
• Ability to maintain a high degree of professionalism at all times, especially in complex/challenging situations.
• Ability to work autonomously and cooperatively as part of an interprofessional team.
• Ability to motivate, empower and enable others.

Your employer pays 23.7% towards your pension and life assurance benefits.

27 days for full time or pro rata if part time.

After 5 years NHS service: 29 days full time or pro rata if part time.

After 10 years NHS service: 33 days full time or pro rata if part time.

Plus bank holidays, that’s up to 41 days - more than 8 weeks paid time off!

Medical staffs have national Terms and Conditions.

Buying and selling of annual leave is also available as part of our flexible approach to staff benefits.

Staff Support

KMPT offers a face to face counselling service for any issues not just work related problems.

NHS discounts and shopping vouchers

Staff can sign up for Red Guava, PS discounts and Health Service Discounts to receive a variety of discounts in travel, fashion, technology, mobile phone contracts, food and drink, days out etc.

Learning and Development opportunities

In addition to the mandatory subjects there are a number of leadership, management and staff topic areas, including coaching and mentoring.

Induction

KMPT is committed to supporting all new staff and this includes a comprehensive Induction programme. The programme's duration depends on role and can be from 2 days to 4 weeks (not always consecutive days).

The Induction programme will provide an excellent opportunity for new staff to meet and engage with KMPT’s subject specialists and include the required training.

The programme may involve some travel to the various training venues across Kent and Medway, the main ones being Canterbury, Maidstone and Dartford.

New starter bonus

At the Trust we really value our nurses and the skills they bring. To recognise this we offer a New Hire Bonus of £1200 pro rata for band 5 and 6 nursing staff.

Staff Network Forums

A variety of staff network forums which empower, support and encourage network members and allies, to reflect KMPT values and promote equality and diversity.

Probation Period: New employees external to Kent and Medway NHS and Social Care Partnership Trust are subject to a six-month probationary period.

To deliver an effective service it is essential in some of our roles that you are able to travel between work bases in a timely manner.

Production of false or forged documents/qualifications in order to obtain employment is a criminal offence and will be reported to the Police.

Disclosure and Barring Service Check: Certain roles are subject to criminal record checks called Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks. Therefore, you will be required to submit a completed Disclosure form to the Disclosure and Barring Service.

KMPT are signed up to NHS England's Sexual Safety in Health Care Organisational Charter.

KMPT takes a systematic zero-tolerance approach to tackle any unwanted, inappropriate and/or harmful sexual behaviours within the workplace and in our care provision. We are committed to sexual safety which encompasses prevention, support and decisive action against perpetrators. We are committed to keeping you and our patients safe.

KMPT is creating an environment for equal opportunities for all, where we can ALL be ourselves.

We take pride in our services – which are underpinned by our Trust values:

• Respect - We value people as individuals, we treat others as we would like to be treated.
• Openness - Work in a collaborative, transparent way.
• Accountability - We are professional and responsible for our actions.
• Working together - We work together to make a difference for our service users.
• Innovation - We find creative ways to run efficient, high quality services.
• Excellence - We listen and learn to continually improve our knowledge and ways of working.

In cases where we receive a high volume of applications for a post, it may be necessary to bring the closing date forward. Please submit your completed application as early as possible to avoid disappointment.

Due to the high volume of applications received, it is not possible to respond individually to your application. Should you not hear from us within six weeks of the vacancy closing, please assume that your application has not been successful.