If you are a Band 5 Occupational Therapist, newly qualified, about to graduate or looking for a chance to develop a variety of experience in a mental health this could be the role for you.
Starting on Amblescroft South, providing inpatient assessments to older adults who are experiencing an organic condition. There would also be the opportunity to spend a day a week working with the Community OT.
In further rotations there would be an opportunity to work on Beechlydene, an acute working age adult ward and to work on Amblescroft North, providing specialist mental health treatment for older adults who may be frail or have multiple physical health conditions, and are experiencing a functional mental health illness.
We are a supportive team and can offer regular supervision, preceptorship, exciting training opportunities and links to the wider therapy team in AWP. You will have support of Band 6 and Band 7 Occupational Therapists and work with Occupational Therapy Assistants and apprentices.
We are looking for Occupational Therapists who are passionate about mental health and ready to develop their occupational therapy skills. You will be working as part of the multidisciplinary team with other allied health professionals, nursing and medical colleagues, focussing on mental health recovery, but additionally physical function and practical abilities of service users.
Responding to the needs of the service, under supervision and working alongside experienced Occupational Therapists and support staff you will develop your skills in a range of OT assessments and group interventions. You will be equipped with training and a toolbox of assessments that can be used, including Vona du Toit Model of Creative Ability, Allen Cognitive Level Screen assessment and Model of Human Occupation. You will need to be a flexible and versatile practitioner who is committed to lifelong learning in order to deliver to an outstanding service. Reflective practice and the use of evidence based interventions will enable you to grow in confidence in this role.
You will be an active and involved member of the multidisciplinary team with an emphasis of developing integrated and meaningful person centred plans of care and promoting the OT role. You will be required to work both in the ward environment but also conduct home assessments to facilitate a safe discharges.
You will have the opportunity to develop the service and the OT team are currently exploring the use of therapeutic garden spaces on the ward.
We are the lead provider of healthcare for people with serious mental illness, learning disabilities and autism across Bath and North East Somerset (BaNES), Swindon and Wiltshire, and Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire.
We aim to provide High Quality, Compassionate Care everywhere, every day. This means our services will be safe, clinically effective and provide a positive all round experience for our patients, families and carers. And we believe passionately in treating everyone with kindness, respect and empathy.
Key to this is providing a supportive and safe environment for our 4,000 staff where we all feel welcome and able to do the best we can for those we support. Our staff and teams work incredibly hard delivering services across more than 90 locations, covering 2,200miles, to more than 1.8million people.
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.
Clinical Responsibilities, Patient Contact
Accountable for designated caseload, working within an evidenced based occupational therapy treatment plan and care programme approach under the guidance of the supervising occupational therapist.
Service users may demonstrate behaviours that challenge and have difficult family situations of relevance.
Undertakes occupational therapy assessments, addressing occupational performance and skill deficits.
Assesses and manages risk effectively in clinical and community settings including the service user’s own home.
Works with service users and carers to identify Occupational Therapy goals as part of the overall Multidisciplinary Team plan.
Develops and implements individual and/or group interventions, in collaboration with the service user(s) and MDT to achieve therapeutic goals.
Uses technical and creative skills to engage service users in therapeutic activities and encourages them in a compassionate manner, to support them in achieving their identified goals.
Monitors and evaluates occupational therapy treatment in order to measure progress and modifies treatment plans to ensure effectiveness of clinical interventions.
Provides reports on service user progress at clinical meetings and participates in the clinical decision-making process regarding service user care programmes as part of the multidisciplinary team.
Provides advice, education and training to service users, carers and other healthcare staff involved in service users’ care.
Undertakes health promotion activities.
Assesses service users for and fits adapted equipment in the home, as appropriate.
Acts as lead professional for service users if no other professional is involved in the service user’s care and may undertake care co-ordination for service users on Care Programme.
Approach where there is an occupational therapy component identified.
Responsible for recognising the potential for or signs of service user harm, abuse or neglect, including poor clinical practice, reporting all such concerns and taking all reasonable steps to protect the service user. Responsible for identifying and reporting concerns regarding the safeguarding of children who may be at risk.
Demonstrates safe moving and handling of service users, using equipment as required.
Demonstrates safe physical interventions in the management of violence and aggression as required.
Administrative Responsibilities
Undertakes administrative tasks in relation to own work.
Uses Microsoft Office applications on a daily basis.
Responsibility for Information Systems.
Responsible for maintaining accurate and comprehensive service user records using RIO or other electronic systems approved by the Trust and in accordance with the Trust and professional record keeping standards.
Writes letters and reports on service users’ progress for distribution to other healthcare professionals.
Contributes to MDT reports.
Records information required for statistical purposes in an accurate and timely manner.
Uses recording tools (e.g. Clustering tool) and related assessments accurately as a key part of the system requirements, where appropriate.
Responsibility for Planning/Organising & Strategic/Business Development Plans own workload, managing competing demands (e.g. urgent referrals) to ensure care is delivered according to clinical priority.
Delegates work to OT assistants whose competence has been established, whilst maintaining professional accountability and ensuring their work meets required professional standards.
Plans, organises and writes session plans for individual service users or groups.
May undertake care co-ordination for service users on Care Programme Approach where there is an occupational therapy component identified.
Plans training sessions, workshops, seminars and poster displays.
Policy Development
Contributes to the development of policies and procedures in own area as part of the Occupational Therapy Team.
Service Development, Project Management.
Participates in continual safety and quality improvement activities as part of the Occupational Therapy Team.
Please see Job Description PDF file for more details.
