Prison Occupational Therapist

How you'll make a difference:

As an Occupational Therapist you will work with adults who may require social care services whilst in prison. You will assess their social care, functional and health needs and work with them to create a support plan, aimed at promoting their independence and meeting their goals, for them to manage the requirements of daily life.

What you will be doing:

• It will be your responsibility to carry out assessments, identify needs and provide advice and guidance to our service users. You will liaise and work closely with contacts from different sectors, including prison, probation and health, working as part of a multi-disciplinary team, ensuring best practice are shared.
• It will be key for you to review and monitor care plans and the quality of the service provision and respond to changes required. This includes, developing and evaluating reablement programs as part of care packages, ensuring that programs to support independence are implemented.
• You will be responsible for managing your own caseloads or specific projects, to ensure specialist inputs are obtained and effective outcomes achieved.
• Carrying out risk assessments and complete safe methods of work practice guides, you will raise awareness of a range of care issues and their implications, in order to ensure that needs are assessed and appropriate action is taken.

As an Advanced Occupational Therapist, you will be required to:

• support students on placement as an experience practitioner.
• be fully up to date with the core training expectations as an Advanced Occupational Therapist.
• examples of using research and evidence-based resources to enhance practice and share learning with team (e.g. use of Research in Practice / other online resources).

What we need from you:

• It is essential that you hold a professional occupational therapy qualification and any further advanced training, and are HCPC registered.
• Giving the elements of this role you must be able to work with the range of professionals based within the prisons, often in a challenging environment.
• We require you to have knowledge of relevant legislation, regulations, codes of practice, and processes.

You will be able to demonstrate that you can manage complex cases and that you can apply excellent assessment skills in practice.

Additionally, as an Advanced Occupational Therapist:

• We will require you to have a minimum of 2 years post qualification experience.
• You will have evidence of meeting the essential (and desirable where possible) criteria for the role of Advanced Occupational Therapist or in South Gloucestershire council.

What you need to know

There are three prisons in South Gloucestershire – HMP Leyhill, HMP Ashfield, and HMP Eastwood Park. HMP Leyhill and HMP Serco Ashfield accommodate male prisoners transferred from other prisons. HMP Eastwood Park is a female prison with generally a younger population with a wide range of complex needs including substance misuse and mental health needs.

• This is a part time role, working 22.5 hours per week.
• Salary is pro-rated to hours worked.
• Due to the nature of this role and the settings you will be working in, you will need to work under tight security rules. You will be required to complete enhanced security vetting and undertake specific training, under the continued support and supervision of the Senior Practitioner and Service Manager.
• Please note that due to the nature of this role, it is a requirement of employment that an enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check is obtained.
• You will need to have a full driver’s licence and have access to a vehicle.

To be considered for the Advanced Social Worker position, your evidence must be clearly detailed in your application.

The salary is offered at points within these bands depending on experience:

• - Social worker: £35,235 - £37,938
• Advanced Social worker: £39,513 - £42,708

Interviews anticipated week commencing 17th March 2025

How a career at South Gloucestershire Council is different

We value our staff as individuals, investing in their careers and we are recognised for the quality, breadth and depth of our training and development offer, which helps make the greatest long-term difference in work.

If you want to develop a specialism, you’ll get the support you need and your cases will be aligned with your areas of expertise.

We are committed to safeguarding and promoting the safety and welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults. Ensuring all our staff are given right skills, knowledge and support to recognise and respond effectively to potential abuse or neglect.

We recognise that our diverse team of skilled and dedicated people make us a great place to work. We welcome applications from everyone and ensure that individuals are selected, promoted and developed on the basis of their merits and abilities.

• We're building and shaping communities which people are proud of.
• We're working with the most vulnerable in our community to help them achieve what they want in life.
• We're investing in our schools to ensure every child and young person in South Gloucestershire achieves their full potential.

We've achieved a great deal, but we need talented and dedicated people to ensure we continue to make a difference.

We're making a difference, be a part of it!

To view the full job description, please click this link: Prison Occupational Therapist