Mental Health Wellbeing Practitioners Lambeth Inpatients

South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust

We are looking for highly motivated individuals to join our inpatient teams as Trainee Mental Health and Wellbeing Practitioners. Several posts are available for the wards currently at Lambeth Hospital, moving in the near future to new premises at the Maudsley Hospital site in Camberwell. This is an exciting new development for this role created by NHS England to support the transformation of adult mental health care. Your training will be fully funded by the NHS, and you will be employed for a fixed term training post while you are successfully engaged with the training programme. You will not be able to apply to any other NHSE funded psychological therapy professions training for two years after the expected completion date of the course.

This role will contribute to ensuring adults with acute presentations of severe mental health problems receive trauma informed care and have greater access to psychologically informed interventions.

Please note: The trainee mental health wellbeing practitioner posts are training positions. Successful candidates will be expected to study at University College London and may need to travel to campus, and will need to travel to the hospital site for their clinical work. Out of hours and shift working (not nights) will be required to suit the ward working pattern.

We are committed to developing a team that is fully representative of the communities that we serve.

Main duties of the job

As a Trainee Mental Health and Wellbeing Practitioner, you will be expected to work under supervision as part of a multidisciplinary team supporting adults to receive the right care in an acute setting. You will need to have flexibility and adaptability and a passion for working with adults with severe mental health problems.

During the one-year graduate certificate or postgraduate certificate training, you will, under supervision, develop knowledge and practice skills to provide care as part of the MDT, working across the nursing team and employing wellbeing-focused psychologically informed interventions for serious mental health problems for adults individually and in groups, as well as supporting their families and carers, in line with the education providers expectations.

About us

The second largest inner London Borough with an official population of around 350,000. The local population has needs related to a high level of social deprivation such as unemployment, poor social housing and child poverty. There are also pockets of greater affluence. There are high levels of morbidity, and levels and complexity of mental health problems are above the national average

Lambeth Hospital comprises five acute wards, a psychiatric intensive care unit, and a rehabilitation ward.

The Trust:The South London and Maudsley (SLaM) NHS Foundation Trust is part of King's Health Partners Academic Health Sciences Centre (AHSC) and committed to innovation, effective interventions and improved service user outcomes. It provides mental health services to the people of Lambeth, Southwark, Lewisham and Croydon, and some more specialist services to people from across the UK.

Job responsibilities

The Trainee Mental Health and Wellbeing Practitioner will:

• attend all elements of the training programme of study and progress successfully through assessments of competence and attainment
• work on an adult inpatient mental health ward when not completing the programme of study
• develop and practice psychologically-informed interventions under supervision, working directly and indirectly with adults on the ward and the ward team
• support collaborative care planning, alongside other members of the multi-disciplinary team, as part of the nursing team
• work closely alongside a team of mental health professionals to deliver a set of brief wellbeing-focused psychologically informed interventions - not therapy - for example:
• Behavioural Activation and Graded Exposure using the GOALS programme
• Problem-solving
• Improving sleep
• Recognising and managing emotions
• Guided self-help for bulimia and binge-eating
• Confidence building
• Support with medicines management

The Trainee Mental Health and Wellbeing Practitioner will be required to:

• Demonstrate the ability to work at degree level
• Have experience of work interacting with the public, working as part of a team, analysing complex information and communicating effectively
• Demonstrate the ability to establish and maintain empathic, supportive relationships with people in significant distress, their families and carers

This is a training role within adult inpatient mental health services. The post-holder will be enrolled in a postgraduate certificate training delivering the national curriculum for Mental Health and Wellbeing Practitioners. Once successfully enrolled, the post-holder will attend all elements of the programme of study and progress successfully through assessments of competence and attainment. Until enrolment, and in the remaining part of the week during training, they will work as a trainee in the service, under close supervision and regular course assessment of practice competence. They will work within the limits of their experience and assessed competence for their stage of training:

• To work alongside service users, families, carers and multi-disciplinary team members to co-ordinate care, supporting collaborative decision-making about care and treatment.
• To deliver a set of wellbeing-focused psychologically-informed interventions, aligned to cognitive-behavioural principles, based on the best evidence available, that address problems often experienced by people with severe mental health problems.

To work within the limits of level of training and experience as a developing practitioner, taking on clinical practice appropriate to assessed levels of competence and stage of training. The post-holder will work as a trainee under close case management supervision from a suitably qualified professional to provide high quality collaborative care planning as a member of the multi-disciplinary team, with a level of autonomy matched to level of demonstrated competence and stage of training. The post-holder will work under close clinical skills supervision from an HCPC registered clinical / counselling psychologist, BABCP accredited cognitive behavioural therapist or Senior MHWP to provide specified psychologically-informed wellbeing-focused interventions, with a level of autonomy matched to level of demonstrated competence and stage of training.

Person Specification

Qualifications

• Batchelors degree at 2:2 in any subject for entry to Postgraduate route
• Enrolled/willingness to enrol on a programme of study for a postgraduate certificate (Level 7) delivering the national curriculum for mental Health and Wellbeing Practitioners (Adult Specialist Mental Health)

Experience

• Experience of work interacting with the public
• Experience working as part of an inpatient team
• Experience of analysing and communicating complex information verbally and in writing
• Lived experience of mental health issues/difficulties

Knowledge / Skills

• Assessment and formulation with client group including of risk
• Psychological interventions with client group
• Serious mental health conditions and acute care context of care planning

Abilities

• Rapport building and communication
• Fitness to undertake required tasks flexibly with complex caseload

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust

Address

Co-lead Secondary Care Psychological Therapies

£31,944 to £34,937 a yearper annum inclusive of HCA

Contract

Fixed term

Duration

12 months

Working pattern

Full-time

Reference number

334-CLI-6763282

Job locations