Specialist Practitioner Psychologist for Cancer Inpatients

We are delighted to be recruiting to a permanent 0.80 WTE band 8b Specialist Practitioner Psychologist for cancer inpatients post . We are looking for a motivated psychologist with an interest in working with inpatients with cancer experiencing associated psychological distress or difficulties, as well as in working with our medical, nursing and AHP colleagues in a collaborative manner to provide high quality holistic care.

The post-holder will be based within the diverse and welcoming Psychology Oncology Support service at Dimbleby Cancer Care (Guy's and St. Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust). We are open to this role being a preceptorship.

The post holder will be located at Guy's hospital with some time at STH hospital. The main responsibility is to create and deliver a psychologically informed service for inpatients with a cancer diagnosis, both curative and palliative, and to create an outpatient follow-up pathway for those discharged. You will be building on the work we have developed over the past 10 years in this area. You will work closely with the lead Clinical Psychologist at POST, Dimbleby Cancer Care to enable this delivery. To also ensure the systematic provision of a high quality and specialist psychology service at Guy's Cancer Centre.

The role will involve creating our strategic vision and key service developments to build and form a workable and sustainable psychology inpatient service for people diagnosed with and affected by cancer, which will include both direct patient and/or carer input and working/liaising/consulting with staff systems, which include cancer staff, Trust staff support and psychiatry liaison, as well as Dimbleby cancer care teams. As part of informing the inpatient service development, the role will oversee audit and research in this area and also be responsible for overseeing junior colleagues and trainees who will deliver inpatient work as part of their role, working with them to create an effective inpatient team. As part of this, and key, is using psychological approaches to inform the set up and delivery of the inpatient service, to create a responsive and compassionate service which integrates and addresses issues of accessibility, power and marginalisation within an inpatient
context.

The role expects you to be autonomous member of Dimbleby Cancer Care and Trust-wide psychology, as required. In conjunction with the Consultant Clinical Psychologist at Dimbleby, to ensure that effective systems are in place for the line management, and the clinical and professional supervision of more junior psychology staff.

Dimbleby Cancer Care

Dimbleby Cancer Care has been providing a service to people with cancer, their friends and families for 20 years at Guy's and St Thomas's and now also at Queen Mary Hospital cancer Centre at Sidcup. The service includes, CNS information, Benefits advice, Complementary Therapy and Psychological therapy, support and education. Support is provided for both outpatients and inpatients, and to those bereaved, and who have received support from our palliative care teams at Guy's and St Thomas.' As well as direct clinical work we also provide staff training, supervision and support.

Psychology Department information

GSTT has a large group of applied psychologists working across many areas of specialisms within both paediatric and adult populations. The psychology department has, Clinical, Counselling, Health, Educational Psychologists and Neuropsychologists. There is well-organised professional support from other applied psychologists working for the Trust. The Psychology Department is within the Therapies directorate that includes Speech and Language Therapists; Occupational Therapists and Physiotherapists.

Clinical:
1. To deliver a highly specialist psychology service for people admitted as inpatients with a cancer diagnosis both with curative and palliative cancers, as well as those significantly involved.
2. To provide a consultative approach to staff working in the inpatient context, and de-briefs and/or training when indicated. To help facilitate a collaborative and psychologically informed approach to managing cancer related distress and associated behaviour.
3. To provide specialist psychological assessments of patients referred based upon the appropriate use, interpretation and integration of psychosocial and medical information, a variety of sources including psychological tests, self-report measures, rating scales, direct and indirect structured observations and semi-structured interviews with patients, family members and others involved as necessary.
4. To collaboratively formulate and implement plans for a good psychological response in relation to an inpatient referral, identifying current psychological concerns, resources available, utilising a, 'who is this a problem for?' approach. Alongside this, a range of approaches, based upon an appropriate conceptual framework of main concerns will be used, employing methods based upon available current evidence of efficacy and effectiveness.
5. To evaluate and make decisions about how best to approach cancer related distress considering theoretical and therapeutic models, and how power and privilege will have shaped the individual, family or group, as well as the staff referring or concerned.
6. To exercise autonomous professional responsibility for the psychological assessment, intervention and discharge of those accessing our service, ensuring that problems are managed by creative and flexible psychologically informed plans.
7. To contribute directly and indirectly to psychological understanding and care to the benefit of all clients of the service, across contexts and agencies of those also involved.
8. To undertake risk assessment and risk management for individual clients and to provide advice to other professions on psychological aspects of risk assessment and risk management when indicated.
9. To communicate in a respectful, considered, timely, and sensitive manner, information concerning the assessment, formulation and plans of clients under their care and liaise within key multi-disciplinary teams/contexts.
10. To develop/build therapeutic and theoretical competency in working with systems and groups, whether that is staff or people with and affected by cancer, e.g. families, or both.
11. To provide supervision and management to junior colleagues.

Teaching, training, and supervision
1. To develop training packages for inpatient staff along with psychology colleagues, including .
2. To receive regular clinical professional supervision from a senior applied psychologist and, where appropriate, from other senior professional colleagues.
3. To gain any additional highly specialist experience and skills relevant to applied psychology and/or the service (as agreed with the professional psychology manager).
4. To develop skills in the area of professional post-graduate teaching, training and supervision and to provide reflective practice or supervision to other members of the multidisciplinary team as appropriate.
5. To provide professional and clinical supervision of trainee and qualified psychological practitioners.
6. To contribute to the pre- and post-qualification teaching of clinical, health and/or counselling psychology, as appropriate.
7. To provide advice, consultation and training to staff working with the client group across a range of agencies and settings, where appropriate.

Management, recruitment, policy and service development
1. To deliver an inpatient psychology service with a steer from senior colleagues.
2. To contribute to the development, evaluation and monitoring of the team's operational policies and services, through the deployment of professional skills in research, service evaluation and audit.
3. To manage the workloads of clinical/counselling psychologists, within the framework of the team/service's policies and procedures and be responsible for performance management, appraisal and recruitment.
4. To be involved, as appropriate, in the short listing and interviewing of assistant/graduate psychologists and psychological therapists.
5. To contribute to the consultation and engagement of service users in planning and developing the psychology service.

Research and service evaluation
1. To contribute to the development of services, both locally and nationally, through initiating, undertaking and supervising complex service evaluation and audit of the inpatient service.
2. To utilise theory, evidence-based literature and research to support evidence-based practice in individual work and work with other team members.
3. To undertake project management, including audit and service evaluation, with colleagues/service users within the service to help develop and inform service provision.
4. To consider ways to meaningfully involve service user feedback in the development of the inpatient service.
5. To initiate, design and recruit to psychological research studies within the context of the Team and assist with writing up.
6. To disseminate research and service evaluation findings through publications in peer reviewed journals and oral presentations internally and at national and international conferences.
7. To utilise theory, evidence-based literature and research to support evidence based practice in individual work and work with other team members.

General
1. To have established an area of specialist clinical or research skills relevant to work within the adult cancer setting through personal development plans agreed with the post-holder's manager.
2. To contribute to the development and maintenance of the highest professional standards of practice, through active participation in internal and external CPD training and development programmes, in consultation with the post holder's professional and service managers.
3. To have developed skills in clinical supervision, in selection and recruitment, and in other areas of service development appropriate to the post, through attending relevant courses and through collaboration with more senior colleagues.
4. To contribute to the development and articulation of best practice in psychology across the service, by continuing to develop the skills of a reflexive and reflective scientist practitioner, taking part in regular professional and clinical supervision and appraisal and maintaining an active engagement with current developments in the field of applied psychology and related disciplines.
5. To maintain the highest standards of clinical record keeping including electronic data entry and recording, report writing and the responsible exercise of professional self governance in accordance with professional codes of practice of the Health Care Professions Council, British Psychological Society, and Trust policies and procedures.
6. To maintain up to date knowledge of legislation, national and local policies and issues in relation to both the specific client group and mental health.