Clinical Psychologist/Counselling Psychologist

Job summary

An exciting opportunity has arisen within the Older Peoples' Psychological Service, alongside Dartford, Gravesend & Swanley (DGS) Community Mental Health team in the North Kent Directorate. This post would suit someone who has a genuine interest in working therapeutically with this varied and rewarding client group. An understanding of the needs of people with mental health difficulties as well as of those living with dementia, and the ability to work with people who have cognitive difficulties, is essential.

We would be happy to receive applications from recently qualified Trainee Clinical Psychologists to recruit into a Band 7/8a preceptorship role. In this circumstance, the post holder would start on band 7 and move upwards. Please read band 7 & 8a job description and person specification. Additional hours may be available.

The post holder must hold a full, valid, UK driving licence and have access to a car/vehicle to use for business purposes (unless you have a disability as defined by the Equality Act 2010).

Main duties of the job

• You will work as part of the Older People's Psychological Services, alongside Community Mental Health Team based in DGS, focussing your time in Memory services & enhancing the provision of psychological approaches for Older People
• The role involves multidisciplinary teamwork with other community & inpatient colleagues to provide a comprehensive service to older people with a wide range of complex mental health difficulties and dementia.
• Experience of neuropsychological assessment for dementia is a key requirement for this post. You will be contributing to key priorities in Older People's psychological services and holding responsibility for line management & clinical supervision of qualified & junior psychology & multidisciplinary (MDT) staff.
• The role will also involve providing consultation to carers, families & teams, participating in multidisciplinary staff development and contributing to group work. Undertaking service evaluations & audits across the North Kent Directorate to enhance service provision of psychological interventions to older people is also a key part of the role.
• You will be expected to travel to other work bases, as required by the responsibilities of the post.

About us

We are Kent and Medway Mental Health NHS Trust. We care for the mental health and wellbeing of people across Kent and Medway and are rated 'Good' by the Care Quality Commission (CQC).

Our teams support children, young people and adults with a wide range of mental health needs. We also provide specialist services, including all-age eating disorder services and neurodevelopmental assessments for children and young people, such as autism and ADHD.

Because we work across the whole county and across hospital and community settings, we can make care more joined up and easier to access for the people we serve.

Our vision is simple: we are here to help communities not just live with mental illness, but live well. It's why we're passionate about working with communities to make mental health care better for everyone. Everything we do is guided by our values: caring, inclusive, curious and confident.

Join us if you share our passion for better mental health care and want to be part of a team that's working well together.

Take a look at our Clinical Associate Psychologist video

Job responsibilities

Please refer to the attached job description for the full details on the responsibilities and person specification

We are serious about diversity and inclusion, and we are working hard to build this into our DNA. We warmly welcome applications for any of our roles from people from diverse backgrounds, and we are proactively encouraging applications from under-represented communities for our more senior roles, like this one.

Person specification

Qualifications

Essential

• Good honours degree in psychology - BPS accredited AND Post graduate doctorate in clinical or counselling psychology accredited by the BPS and HCPC registered practitioner psychologist.

Experience

Essential

• Experience of working in range of mental health settings with a range of levels of disability and full range of age groups.
• Experience of working with people with dementia or cognitive impairments.
• Experience of administering and interpreting neuropsychological assessments

Knowledge & Skills

Essential

• Ability to comprehend and communicate verbally and in writing highly complex and sensitive information in a manner appropriate to a range of settings and audiences, including complex highly emotive situations and those with significantly impaired communication capacities.
• Ability to analyse and manage complex multi-factorial clinical information from a range of sources integrating it into a formulation utilising a variety of psychological perspectives.
• Ability to organise own workload effectively, prioritising a complex range of tasks and responsibilities to meet agreed deadlines.
• Adequate keyboard skills and sound understanding of I.T. packages.