Job summary
- Main area
- Assistant Psychologist
- Grade
- Band 4
- Contract
- Permanent
- Hours
- Full time - 37.5 hours per week (Monday-Friday 9-5pm)
- Job ref
- 350-MHC7332645
- Employer
- Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust
- Employer type
- NHS
- Site
- Mersey Care Inpatient Units in St Helens and Halton
- Town
- St Helens
- Salary
- £27,485 - £30,162 per annum
- Salary period
- Yearly
- Closing
- 27/07/2025 23:59
- Interview date
- 11/08/2025
Employer heading
Assistant Psychologist
Band 4
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Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust celebrates diversity and promotes equal opportunities; we are committed to challenging and eliminating racism and other forms of discrimination and advancing and promoting equality of opportunity in the provision of services and creating an inclusive environment for all employees. We believe that everyone has the right to be treated with dignity and respect.
We take positive action to support disadvantaged groups and also particularly encourage applications from ethnically diverse, disabled and LGBTQIA+ people that are under-represented in our workforce. Furthermore we welcome applications from reservists and ex-armed forces personnel as we recognise the benefits of the values, skills, training and experience that they bring to their work with us. We encourage all applicants to share their equality information with us.
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Job overview
We are looking for Assistant Psychologists to work as an integral part of the inpatient psychology team on male and female inpatient units. These posts will be based on acute adult inpatient wards and will contribute to therapeutic activities and psychological interventions. There will be vacancies based in both St Helens (Peasley Cross Hospital) and Halton (Brooker Centre).
The successful candidate will support and enhance the professional psychological care of service users working as part of a multi-disciplinary team including psychology, psychiatry, nursing staff and occupational therapy. The team regularly work with other services including social care, community mental health teams, based on individual need. You will receive regular supervision as well as informal support from a qualified psychologist.
The post holder will have excellent communication and interpersonal skills and will have demonstrated ability to work effectively as part of a team. Above all you must be passionate about working with adults with acute mental health difficulties.
As an NHS employer we value authenticity and honesty. If using Artificial Intelligence (AI) it's important to ensure your application accurately reflects your skills and experience. Always review and personalise the content and include specific examples from your own experience to demonstrate how you meet the criteria for the role.
Main duties of the job
Due to the complex and demanding nature of the role, you will ideally have previous experience in either a similar role and/or with a similar patient group.
The role will involve supporting psychological assessments and evidence based interventions under the supervision of a qualified Psychologist. Assistant Psychologists will work with the Psychologist in promoting psychological support on inpatient wards.
The Assistant Psychologist will deliver group and individual psychological interventions for service users on the ward. You will be expected to attend and contribute towards daily ward meetings and you will work hard to improve inpatient care focusing on enhancing the therapeutic environment.
There will be opportunities to support inpatient services in audit and research, in order to inform service development and support best practice. We have good links with the universities and MCFT research department and we will do our best to support this if this is your area of interest.
We have successful and established models of care on our inpatient wards. We have the Self Harm Pathway and Positive Behaviour Support (PBS) and you will be expected to support these pathways on the wards.
The successful applicants must have a degree in psychology, which confers Graduate Basis for Chartered Membership with the British Psychological Society (BPS).
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.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
Duties and Responsibilities
To support Qualified Psychologists by undertaking psychological assessments of clients applying psychologically based psychometric tests, self-report measures, rating scales, direct and indirect structured observations and semi-structured interviews with clients, family members and others involved in the client’s care.
To undertake psychological assessments of service users under the supervision of a qualified psychologist which may include, as appropriate, a range of psychometric tests, self-report measures, rating scales, direct and indirect structured observations and semi-structured interviews with service users, carers and others involved in the client’s care.
To assist in the formulation and delivery of care plans involving the psychological treatment and/or management of a client’s problems, under the supervision of a qualified professional psychologist, in a range of settings as appropriate.
To assist in the coordination and running of therapeutic groups.
To work with other disciplines to assess inpatients, outpatients, day patients or residents and review their care in preparation for multi-disciplinary reviews.
To assist in the development of a psychological framework of understanding and care to all service users of the service, across all care settings.
To attend and contribute to appropriate multi-disciplinary meetings as directed by the qualified psychologists.
To use a degree of initiative and work independently with service users on planned work, and to exercise judgement based on good practice (NICE) and local operating procedures.
To work with potentially distressing material in relation to service users’ personal histories and presentation, including risk to self and others.
In common with all clinical psychologists, to receive regular clinical supervision in accordance with professional practice guidelines and trust policy.
To develop skills and competencies that assist in the delivery of current duties
Where appropriate, and under the supervision of qualified staff, contribute to the training and support of other staff in psychological care.
To assist in the design and implementation of service development projects within the service as required.
To attend meetings in which service developments are planned and discussed as required.
To be competent in the use of basic IT packages, such as Microsoft word.
Develop a skill base in the administration and analysis of a range of psychometric packages as directed.
To assist in the design and implementation of audit, effectiveness, and research projects.
To undertake data collection, analysis, the production of full reports and summaries, using IT and statistical programmes.
To review evidence-based literature and research to assist qualified psychologists and work with other team members in their clinical responsibilities as necessary.
To prepare test materials and visual aids as required.
General
To contribute to the development and maintenance of the highest professional standards of practice, through active participation in appropriate CPD training and development programmes, in consultation with the postholder’s professional and team/operational manager(s).
To maintain the highest standards of clinical record keeping and report writing in accordance with professional codes of practice of the British Psychological Society, and Trust policies and procedures.
To prepare test materials and visual aids as required and to maintain stock of same where necessary.
To undertake specific administrative duties as required.
To perform other duties of a similar kind appropriate to the grade, which may be required by their Psychological Services Manager
Person specification
QUALIFICATIONS:
Essential criteria
- A honours degree that satisfies the British Psychological Society criteria for graduate basis for chartered membership
KNOWLEDGE/EXPERIENCE:
Essential criteria
- A minimum of 12 months experience of work with people with mental health problems and/or other disabilities
- Experience of research evaluation and audit of the application of psychological principles to mental health problems
- High level communication skills (written and verbal) including an ability to communicate and work in settings in which the atmosphere may be highly emotive
- Experience using computers for databases or data-analysis
- Experience of report writing
- Demonstrated high level ability to communicate sensitive information to service users, carers and colleagues in a way that facilitates engagement
- An understanding of the needs and difficulties of people with mental health problems or other disabilities
- A demonstrated ability to apply existing psychological knowledge to a mental health context
- An understanding of psychological principles applied to health care
Desirable criteria
- Experience as an Assistant Psychologist in an healthcare setting
VALUES
Essential criteria
- Continuous Improvement
- Accountability
- Respectfulness
- Enthusiasm
- Support
- High professional standards
- Responsive to service users
- Strong customer service belief
- Transparency and honesty
- Discreet
SKILLS
Essential criteria
- Experience in managing conflict, and balancing demand for resources with availability and prioritisation
- Experience of working with complex presentations
- Experience of taking decisions relating to the risk or safety of individuals and carrying professional responsibility for those decisions within a safeguarding and risk framework
- Clear experience of interacting effectively with staff from all disciplines
- An interest in working with people with mental health problems or other disabilities
- Clear experience of interacting with people with mental health problems
- Ability to work with a high level of autonomy within the boundaries of the assistant role
- Ability to accept and use supervision appropriately and effectively
Employer certification / accreditation badges
Applicant requirements
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.
Documents to download
Further details / informal visits contact
- Name
- Dr Holly Riches
- Job title
- Clinical Psychologist
- Email address
- [email protected]
- Additional information
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