Clinical Psychologist or CBT Specialist

Job overview

We are currently looking to recruit an experienced Band 8a Clinical Psychologist or CBT Specialist to lead on an NIHR funded randomised controlled trial of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in very young children aged 2-8 years old.

Our team works with young people with who are experiencing moderate to severe emotional, behavioural, or mental health difficulties.

As a team we believe that service user participation and feedback is an integral part of the development and delivery of services and supports care which is person centred and inclusive

Main duties of the job

They will be responsible for the administration of a Trauma-Focused CBT Intervention for young children aged 2-8 years with PTSD, for comparison to usual care.

The post holder will also act as the Trail Lead, coordinating other trial related activities and leading the evaluation and dissemination of the findings from the trial. The post holder will manage one assistant psychologist and work closely with another Therapist based in London at the South London and Maudsley (SLaM) NHS Trust.

The post is available from 1st February 2025 for a fixed-term of 3 years.

Working for our organisation

Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust is a health and social care organisation dedicated to providing high-quality care with compassion to improve the health and wellbeing of the people we care for, as well as supporting and empowering them to lead a fulfilling life.

Our clinical teams deliver many NHS services, not only via inpatient and primary care settings, but also within the community. These services include children's, adult and older people's mental health, forensic and specialist mental health, learning disabilities, primary care and liaison psychiatry, substance misuse, social care, research and development.

To achieve our goal, we look to recruit high-calibre candidates who share our vision and values. As an equal opportunities employer, we encourage applications from all sectors of the community, particularly from under-represented groups including people with long term conditions and members of our ethnic minority and LGBTQ+ communities.

Please be advised we reserve the right to close adverts earlier than the closing date should we receive sufficient applications.

Regrettably, we cannot offer sponsorship for all our job roles. If you apply for a role that we cannot offer sponsorship for, unfortunately, your application form will be rejected from the process.

For further information on CPFT, please visit our website at www.cpft.nhs.uk

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

1. To provide evidence based assessment of participants who were referred to the trial after providing informed consent.
2. To formulate and implement treatment plans for psychological treatment in line with the treatment protocol and considering the participant’s problems. The post holder needs to have the capacity to recognize and identify participants for whom the protocol may not be appropriate. These participants should be allocated to suitable service providers.
3. To exercise professional responsibility for the assessment, psychological formulation, treatment and discharge of participants.
4. To provide specialist psychological advice, guidance and consultation to other professionals contributing directly to participants’ formulation, diagnosis and treatment plan within the trial protocol.
5. To communicate, in a highly skilled and sensitive manner, to participants and others (e.g., the participant’s GP) as appropriate, information that may be contentious or highly distressing concerning the assessment, formulation and treatment plans of participants under their care.
6. To maintain clinical records and produce clinical reports as appropriate, which adhere to the trial protocol.
7. Reliably establish on-going consent throughout a participant’s trial participation.
8. To deal with risk issues.
9. To participate in the multidisciplinary systems for monitoring and managing workload as agreed by the professional and line manager.
10. To work within levels of professional competence.

Person specification

Education / Qualifications

• Professional training in clinical psychology, including working with children.

• Eligibility for HCPC Membership in the UK

Experience

• Experience of specialist psychological assessment and treatment of clients with a range of diagnoses.
• Experience of working within a CBT framework
• Experience using case-conceptualisation to formulate a treatment approach.
• Experience of exercising full clinical responsibility for client’s psychological care and treatment.
• Experience of the application of clinical psychology in different contexts.

• Experience of working with clients with PTSD
• Experience of working with young children
• Experience of teaching, training and/or supervision.

Skills & Abilities

• Skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment, psychological formulation, intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration. This requires the use of highly developed analytical and judgement skills.
• High standard of report writing for communication with professionals from NHS, Local Authority and other agencies, parents/ carers and clients.
• Well developed skills in the ability to communicate effectively, orally and in writing, complex, highly technical and/or clinically sensitive information, including contentious and highly distressing information, to clients, their families, carers and other professional colleagues both within and outside the NHS.
• Ability to identify and employ mechanisms of clinical governance, including regular supervision, to support and maintain clinical practice in the face of regular exposure to highly emotive material and challenging behaviour.
• Knowledge of research methodology, research design and data analysis as practised within the field of clinical psychology.

Knowledge & Understanding

• Excellent interpersonal and communication skills to promote effective working with clients.
• Able to contain and work with high levels of distress from clients
• Ability to exercise appropriate levels of self-care and to monitor own state, recognising when it is necessary to take active steps to maintain fitness to practice.

Here at Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust (CPFT) we are dedicated to providing high quality care with compassion. We deliver many of the NHS services that are provided outside of hospital and in the community such as physical, mental health and specialist services.

We are a health and social care organisation, offering a wide range of services, including:

• Integrated physical and mental health services for adults and older people;
• Specialist mental health and learning disability services;
• Children and young people’s mental health services;
• Children’s community services in Peterborough;
• Social care;
• Ground-breaking research

We strongly encourage applications from all sections of the community, particularly from under-represented groups including disabled people and members of our ethnic minorities and LGBTQ+ communities. For further information about our positive equality, diversity and Inclusion work, please visit https://www.cpft.nhs.uk/equalityanddiversity.

CPFT is looking to build upon its pool of temporary workers with Temporary Staffing Services (TSS). You will be asked at interview if you would be willing to register with TSS. This is an excellent opportunity for those looking to take on additional hours that are flexible around your personal circumstances.

Please be advised that in line with the WHO Health Workforce Support and Safeguards List, 2020 Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust currently are unable to accept applications from overseas candidates whose country of residence is classed as a ‘Red List’ country.

Applicants who require entry into the UK will be required to provide a valid police certificate from the relevant authority from each country (except the UK) where the applicant has been present for 12 months or more, 10 years before the date of visa application, while aged 18 or over.

If you are successful at interview you will be subject to pre-employment checks, including a DBS (if appropriate), references and Occupational Health. To ensure a smooth process please bring all identity documents to your interview. A list of required identity documents will be attached to your interview invitation.

All communications will be sent to you via TRAC Systems. By applying for this post you are agreeing to CPFT transferring the information contained in this application to TRAC. If you are made an offer, information will also be transferred into the national NHS Electronic Staff Records system.