• Better outcomes for our Patients
• More opportunities for our People
• Fairer more consistent care for our Population
• Best Value for Public Purse

Our Vision For Five Years From Now

• Patients will wait less time to be diagnosed and treated, and they will have the same high-quality experience and outcomes, regardless of who they are or where they live.
• We will meet rising demand by maximising the use of our available resources.
• More care will be delivered nearer to patients, in their homes or the community.
• Digital technologies will have transformed the way we work and the way we deliver care.
• Our people will feel engaged, energised and empowered by their work.
• We will be known as a place where people enjoy working, training and building a career.
• Our volume of globally renowned research and innovation will have grown significantly.
• We will contribute to system financial balance

Detailed Job Description And Main Responsibilities

This department of pain management and health psychology specialises in interventions concerning health crisis and long term conditions, involving trauma, surgery, cancer and other life-changing health matters. As such the post holder:

• will undertake an appropriate level of clinical supervision, making all reasonable efforts to ensure the effectiveness of the supervision arrangements in providing safe and effective psychological care for patients.
• will prioritise and manage their own face-to-face work with clients whilst also balancing this, through a process of line management, with the collective responsibilities and goals of both the department and North Bristol NHS Trust.

This department is constantly engaged in project work and service improvement, processes, often in partnership with, or under contract to, external organisations. Assistant psychologists have a close involvement in delivering these and are responsible for ensuring compliance with any specified standards and procedures associated with such projects in addition to usual NHS standards and criteria. Usually this means that the post holder is therefore required to follow research protocols involving additional consent, evaluation, and data processing commitments. This is in addition to always adhering to the policies and procedures of both the department and NBT.

The specific areas of duty and responsibility in this post are:

• To compile and maintain databases in association with the head of department regarding the clinical assessment, audit, and research activities undertaken by the department.
• To support the recruitment, training and on-going support of volunteers in the service, including on-going evaluation of the roles that volunteers take and the re-design prompted by findings/feedback.
• The provision of psychology input to assigned areas of the service, providing psychological interventions with individual patients and groups referred to the service who have been assessed as needing such interventions. This is likely to also involve organising and coordinating aspects of delivering group-based interventions for pain, post critical care distress, cancer recovery, and pain-related insomnia. The prioritising and throughput of this work is agreed with the line manager.
• The coordination of audit data gathering, conducting psychometric assessments of patients referred to the service. Providing research advice and consultation within the department for the preparation of new research protocols and for the presentation and dissemination of research findings.
• Participating in the training and support of staff from outside the department in respect of the principles of psychological care and biopsychosocial interventions in long term conditions.
• The post holder will work to a Job Plan (reviewed at least annually) and linked to this, a professional development plan, to advance competencies and knowledge regarding the clinical work of the department. This is established and monitored through participation in a performance review.
• The post holder will fully participate in clinical governance processes, service meetings, clinical audit, the development and observation of service standards and improvement initiatives, observing local and national guidance.
• The post holder will undertake regular clinical supervision with a senior clinical psychologist from the department (usually the line manager) in line with explicit supervision arrangements. The post holder will at all times observe professional, and ethical guidelines, and stated good practise guidelines for clinical psychologists, as set out by the BPS and HCPC.
• Participate in the professional organisation of psychologists and related professionals within BFT

Person specification

Qualifications

Essential criteria

• good honours degree in psychology (usually first or upper second class)
• relevant experience as an assistant psychologist
• NHS work experience

We hope that you will decide to join us and become part of this exciting journey, helping us to shape our future together.

As an equal opportunities employer actively working towards a diverse workforce we aim to recruit and retain a workforce which represents the rich diversity of the local population at all levels and are committed to designing our services around the needs of individual patients and those around them. Anonymous information will be used from your application to ensure we’re meeting our pledge.

The Trust is committed to investing in and caring for all our staff. We will support you in maintaining and improving your health and wellbeing, as well as your career development through management and training support - developing exceptional people for exceptional careers.

BFT is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people, and vulnerable adults.

To comply with Part 7 of the Immigration Act 2016 all applicants must be able to speak fluent English to an appropriate standard which will be assessed at Interview.

If you require sponsorship for a visa to work in the UK, to avoid disappointment, please check to ensure you are eligible under the UKVI points based system.

The Trust uses electronic new starter forms on Trac to collect personal details. Information collected is securely stored and used to set up the employee record on the ESR HR system.

By applying for this post, you are agreeing to Bristol NHS Foundation Trust transferring the information contained in this application to its preferred applicant management system. If you are offered a job, information will also be transferred into the national NHS Electronic Staff Records system.

Please be aware of scams – unless specified above, we will only communicate with you via @recruit.trac.jobs or nhs.net e-mails and we will never ask you for any payments.

Important

Please note that if you apply for a position with this Trust, you may be contacted via Trac or via email. This includes invites for job interviews. We therefore recommend that you regularly check your Trac account and email accounts. We may also contact you by texting the mobile number, if provided, on the application form