Band 8a Highly Specialist Clinical/Counselling Psychologist

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Band 8a Highly Specialist Clinical/Counselling Psychologist

NHS AfC: Band 8a

Main area Psychology Grade NHS AfC: Band 8a Contract Permanent Hours

• Full time
• Part time

37.5 hours per week (Part time / less than full time applicants are welcome to apply and will be considered.) Job ref 391-RFL-8200302-A

Site Royal Free Hospital Town London Salary £66,274 - £73,496 Per annum inclusive of HCAS (part time are calulated pro-rata) Salary period Yearly Closing 12/10/2026 23:59

Our trust has over 17,000 staff serving 2 million patients every year. It comprises Barnet Hospital, Chase Farm Hospital, the Royal Free Hospital, North Middlesex University Hospital and more than 30 services in the community. This larger scale organisation provides an unprecedented opportunity for us to continue our pioneering work, particularly in finding ways to deliver even better care to our patients.

Our mission is to deliver world class care and expertise in our clinical services, underpinned by world class teaching and research and we will continue to measure our progress against our five governing objectives: excellent outcomes, excellent patient and staff experience, excellent value for taxpayers’ money, being safe and meeting our external duties, and building a strong organisation.

Everyone is welcome at Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust. We're proud of our diversity and we continue to undertake new initiatives to advance equality for LGBT+, BME, gender equality, staff carers and people with disabilities and lived experiences to promote good relations and understanding between our staff.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a set of technology that can perform various tasks that typically required human intelligence. Your application is your opportunity to demonstrate to us how you meet the requirements of the role. We recognise that AI tools can support accessibility, equity and confidence for applicants.However, it’s important that examples and responses genuinely reflect your own experience and abilities, as these will be explored further during the selection process. AI must not be used to provide misleading or false information during any stage of the application journey. Further guidance can be found in the NLPSS Applicant Toolkit https://royalfree.pagetiger.com/cuuomnr/1 .

Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust is committed to ensuring that its recruitment processes are carried out with integrity, transparency, and fairness for all applicants. To help maintain these standards, we ask candidates to provide accurate and truthful information throughout the recruitment process.

If incorrect or misleading information is identified, this may affect the progression of an application, any employment offer, or continued employment. As part of our due diligence, the company may verify the information provided by applicants and take appropriate act ion where necessary.

We do not charge applicants any fees at any stage of the recruitment process, including applications, interviews, sponsorship arrangements, pre-employment checks, or employment offers. All vacancies are advertised through TRAC/NHS Jobs and candidates are assessed solely on their skills, qualifications, experience, and suitability for the role. If you are asked to make a payment in connection with an NHS job opportunity, please treat this as suspicious and contact the organisation directly using the details published on our official career's website

We welcome and will consider applicantions from those interested in this role at either full time or part time hours with a minimum of 30 hours per week due to service needs.

The post holder will join a team of highly experienced clinical psychologists, providing specialist psychological assessment, formulation and treatment for people living with HIV.

They will lead the specialist clinical/counselling psychology service within HIV care, including clinical supervision and line management, and work autonomously within professional guidelines and service policies.

The role includes delivering psychological therapy for issues affecting HIV management, adherence and prevention of transmission, as well as supporting patients with depression, anxiety, bereavement, trauma, psychosexual difficulties and addiction.

The post holder will support the multidisciplinary team in delivering integrated care through consultation, training and advice on psychological aspects of patient care. They will also undertake complex risk assessments and provide specialist guidance to non-psychologist colleagues.

The role includes teaching within the service and wider department, promoting psychology, and disseminating psychological knowledge within the HIV care team and externally, including at conferences. The post holder will contribute to audit, service development, policy development and research, using advanced research skills to improve patient care.

Main duties of the job

Provide highly specialist psychological assessments for patients referred to the HIV Psychology Service, integrating complex information from multiple sources. Formulate and deliver evidence-based psychological treatment and management plans across a range of care settings, using appropriate conceptual frameworks.

Make expert decisions regarding psychological interventions, taking into account theoretical and therapeutic models, developmental and historical factors, and the individual's medical and social circumstances.

Provide specialist psychological advice, guidance and consultation to professionals within the HIV Service, contributing directly to patient formulation, diagnosis and treatment planning.

Undertake risk assessment and management for individual patients, providing both general and specialist advice to psychologists and other healthcare professionals.

Communicate highly complex and sensitive information regarding assessment, formulation and treatment plans, and monitor and evaluate patient progress throughout uni-disciplinary and multidisciplinary care.

Provide psychological support to newly diagnosed patients and deliver specialist HIV transmission prevention advice to patients and their contacts, including prevention of vertical transmission. Facilitate appropriate disclosure of HIV status to partners, family members and children where appropriate.

Further information is available in the job description and person specification.

Working for our organisation

The Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust is one of the UK’s biggest and most innovative trusts. Across three main hospitals, our dedicated army of staff care for over 1.6million patients, treat more than 200,000 in A&E, deliver over 8,000 babies and carry out more than 17million tests.
Our size, scale and influence offer you unrivalled career opportunities and a forward-thinking approach to working that works around your lifestyle. From flexible hours and generous benefits, to next level training, we make it easier to take your career to the top
For more information please follow link https://www.royalfreelondonjobs.co.uk/

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Please see attached Job Description for more information about this role and working at royal free London NHS foundation Trust

Person specification

Royal Free Shared Commitments

• Demonstrable ability to meet the Trust shared commitments

Education & professional Qualifications

• Doctoral level training in counselling/clinical psychology including specifically, models of psychopathology, two or more distinct psychological therapies and lifespan developmental psychology.
• Post-doctoral training in one or more additional specialist areas of psychological practice.

Experience

• Substantial experience of working as a qualified Clinical/Counselling Psychologist.
• Experience of working with a wide variety of patient groups, across the whole life course and presenting with the full range of clinical severity across the full range of care settings including outpatient, community, primary care, in-patient and residential care settings including maintaining a high degree of professionalism in the face of highly emotive and distressing problems, verbal abuse and the threat of physical abuse.
• Experience of exercising full clinical responsibility for patients’ psychological care and treatment, both as a professionally qualified care coordinator and within the context of a multi-disciplinary care plan.
• Experience of teaching, training and/or professional and clinical supervision.
• Experience of management, recruitment, supervision, human resource management and policy development and implementation.
• Experience of professional management of qualified and pre-qualified clinical psychologists.
• Experience of the application of psychology in different cultural contexts.
• Post qualification experience within HIV / sexual health / physical health.
• Experience of multi-professional management of teams or services within the designated specialty.
• Experience of representing the profession in local policy forums.

Skills and aptitudes

• Pp dip level knowledge of Clinical or counselling psychology including highly developed knowledge of lifespan developmental psychology, models of psychopathology, and two or more distinct psychological therapies.
• Skills in the use of complex methods of psychological assessment intervention and management frequently requiring sustained and intense concentration.
• A high-level ability to communicate effectively at both a written and oral level complex, highly technical and clinically sensitive information to patients, their families, carers and a wide range of lay and professional people within and outside the NHS.
• PP Dip level knowledge of research design and methodology, including complex multivariate data analysis as practiced within the field of clinical/ counselling psychology.
• Knowledge of legislation and its implications for both clinical practice and professional management in relation to the patient group and mental health.
• Evidence of continuing professional development as recommended HPCP.
• Highly developed knowledge of the theory and practice of specialised psychological therapies in specific difficult to treat groups (e.g. personality disorder dual diagnoses, people with additional disabilities and severely challenging behaviours etc.).
• Highly developed knowledge of the theory and practice of highly specialised psychological therapies.
• Formal training in supervision of other psychologists.

Other

• Ability to identify, and employ, as appropriate, clinical governance mechanisms for the support and maintenance of clinical practice in the face of regular exposure to highly emotive material and challenging behavior.
• Ability to develop and use complex multi-media materials for presentations in public, professional and academic settings.
• Ability to articulate and interpret clearly the role of the profession of counselling psychology based upon a good understanding of the framework of government and national professional policy.
• Experience of working within a multicultural framework.
• Record of having published in peer reviewed or academic or professional journals and/or books.

Personal qualities and attributes

• Enthusiasm for a broad range of psychological phenomena, an interest in models of service delivery, and an ability to articulate the value added by psychology services within the context of multi- disciplinary mental health services.
• Ability to contain and work with organizational stress and ability to ‘hold’ the stress of others. Ability to identify, provide and promote appropriate means of support to carers and staff exposed to highly distressing situations and severely challenging behaviours.
• Ability to demonstrate leadership and management skills.
• A commitment to the evaluation of services, enthusiasm for both multi-professional and uni- professional audit, and a wish to continue to develop expertise in the service area.
• AT* - Apprenticeship Training. Where AT* is entered next to the job title indicates that this vacancy is for an apprenticeship role.
• By applying for this role, you accept if successful, that your personal data may be transferred from the Trust to another NHS organisation where your employment transfers within the NHS.This is in accordance with the streamlining programme which aims at saving you time and improving efficiencies within the NHS when your employment transfers.Therefore we require you to complete your stat and Man e-learning modules prior to joining our organisation.
• If you are an EU/EEA citizen who does not have EU Settlement or Pre-Settled status, you will require a visa to work in the UK.
• You must already have the right to work in the United Kingdom or fully meet the eligibility criteria for sponsorship under the Skilled Worker visa route. We welcome applications from candidates who require visa sponsorship; however, we can only consider these where all UKVI requirements are met. Before applying, please ensure that both you and the role satisfy the relevant UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) points‑based system criteria, as applications that do not meet these requirements cannot be progressed. For more information about the criteria, please click here
• The Trust uses electronic new starter forms on Trac to collect personal details. Information collected is securely stored and used to set up the employee record on the ESR HR system.
• The Trust will request a DBS (CRB) if post involves regulated activities. The Trust is compliant with the Disclosure and Barring Service Codes of practice and the Rehabilitation of offenders act.
• By applying for this post you are agreeing to Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust transferring the information contained in this application to its preferred applicant management system. If you are offered a job, information will also be transferred into the national NHS Electronic Staff Records system.
• Please be aware of scams – unless specified above, we will only communicate with you via @recruit.trac.jobs or nhs.net e-mails and we will never ask you for any payments.

Applications are welcome from people wishing to job share or work flexible patterns. We are committed to equal opportunities.

Please note:

• Due to the high number of applications that are received for some posts we may close this vacancy before the advertised closing date. Therefore please apply for this post as soon as you can, if you are interested and you meet the requirements of the Person Specification
• Only those candidates who clearly demonstrate how they meet the person specification will be shortlisted for this job.
• Interview arrangements will be communicated via email so please check your email regularly following the closing date.

Please be advised that due to exceptionally high demand, all Royal Free accommodation is at full capacity and waiting lists are being held. Average waiting times are 12 months. Please do not rely on Trust accommodation when you commence your role and ensure you investigate alternative accommodation for your arrival.

Employer certification / accreditation badges

You must have appropriate UK professional registration.

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975

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