[ref. n79984924] Avon Products - Band 6 MINT Specialist Mental Health Practitioner - Weston-Super-Mare

Job overview

The role promotes and provides early assessment, treatment and improved access to evidence-based interventions supporting people contacting primary care for help with their mental health needs.

Please note: This post is open to newly qualified social workers. In line with AWP trust policy all newly qualified social workers (NQSW) will be recruited initially at Band 5 level, regardless of advertised role banding. All NQSW’s are expected to successfully complete their ASYE within 2 years of employment, unless there are exceptional circumstances in which case it may be extended for a further 2 years.

If you have been appointed to an advertised Band 6 role this will be an automatic progression, following confirmation of your successful ASYE completion. If you have been appointed to a Band 5 post you will then be eligible to apply for a subsequent Band 6 vacancy upon successful ASYE completion.

Main duties of the job

The Specialist Mental Health Practitioner role will help people over 18 years old, who are accessing support through primary care, to define achievable goals and access local community resources.

Areas of focus will include:

• Those with mental health needs that do not meet the access criteria for IAPT (Improving Access to Psychological Therapies provided through Vita Health) and do not meet the access criteria for secondary care.
• People with serious or significant mental illness (SMI) who are supported within recovery services and relatively stable in secondary care mental health services, who could be cared for within primary care.
• Those diagnosed with, or presenting with traits of, personality disorder who will benefit from being signposted to services who can best meet their needs
• Older adults with complex presenting issues
• First contact with primary care

Working for our organisation

We are AWP (Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust): a diverse organisation with over 5,000 dedicated staff providing inpatient and community-based mental health care.

We provide services from a range of locations to approximately 1.8 million people living in Bath and North East Somerset (B&NES), Bristol, North Somerset, South Gloucestershire, Swindon, across the county of Wiltshire and in parts of Dorset.

Our outstanding people promote mental health and wellbeing. The expertise and resources within AWP are dedicated to a person-centred approach for those who use our services and for all employees. We recognise that happy and fulfilled employees give better care.

At AWP we actively encourage applicants from all backgrounds; we are particularly keen to encourage applications from people from Black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds, those with disabilities and from the LGBTQ+ community. We want people to bring their unique blend of experiences, backgrounds, perspectives and knowledge to AWP, as diversity makes us stronger.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Facilitate mental health and ‘strengths-based’ support conversations in Primary Care and support the Primary Care Team in accessing appropriate level of services

Promote understanding and confidence in the delivery of mental health care and collaboration with all agencies involved in the care of service users

Where required, train and supervise junior staff in line with own role

Promote the importance of working with strengths and aspirations of the person referred.

Provide succinct formulations and recommendations (inclusive of risk management advice) to support patient safety planning.

Person specification

Qualifications

• Registered Mental Health Nurse, Social Worker or Occupational Therapist
• Post qualifying experience working in the community

• additional training (ie CBT, DBT or other)

This includes people with a variety of disabilities and neurodivergent conditions (for example autism, ADHD, sensory, physical and learning disabilities).

We encourage applications from people who wish to work on a flexible basis, recognising that flexibility may mean a range of different working patterns and hours, we do our utmost to work with our staff to meet their needs and the needs of our service users.

Click here to view our applicant guidance

Please apply to join us, we would love to hear from you. Any personal details you supply to us are kept safe in line with the General Data Protection Regulations.

Adverts normally close for application a few minutes before midnight on the closing date and we will let you know if we are offering you an interview by email via our recruitment system ‘TRAC’. We contact all applicants within 4 weeks after the closing date, so please check your emails regularly once you have submitted your application; you are welcome to contact us, via the TRAC system, if you have any queries about your application.

Please note the use of AI is monitored and if you have used it in your application you are required to declare this.