Highly Specialist Child & Adolescent Psychotherapist

This is an exciting opportunity for a clinician with experience of working with Children Looked After (CLA) to join an experienced CAMHS team that is co‑located with Children's Social Care.

The core clinical role has a consultative focus, including offering group and individual consultation to Social Workers. The role will have a small clinical caseload of direct work with CLA, carers and birth parents. This role has an exciting additional focus on reunification. It will involve both direct and indirect clinical intervention with young people, birth parents and the wider network to support successful reunification.

Our work is framed within a stepped model of care; and is guided by Islington CLA's Practice Models (DDP, Mentalisation, Motivational Practice, Return Home). We are a dynamic, multidisciplinary team and offer opportunities for continued professional development and reflective practice. We encourage applications from all sections of the community to develop a team which is more representative of our client groups.

• Provide specialist mental health advice and consultation to Social Workers in the Children Looked After Service to support their practice and management of young people presenting with a range of presentations and needs.
• Attend group supervision, sharing clinical and mental health knowledge and expertise to contribute to case discussion.
• Facilitate consultations with Social Workers and supervising social workers to enhance trauma‑informed, relationship‑based practice with children and carers.
• Provide specialist mental health assessment, formulation and interventions with children, young people and care‑givers.
• Provide specialist evidence‑based intervention for looked after children and carers, drawing on innovative ways of engagement and intervention.
• Provide specialist evidence‑based interventions for birth parents to aid reunification, including processing of their experiences of having a child removed and relational work to rebuild the parent‑child relationship.
• Formulate and devise clinical management plans for a range of specialist psychological interventions – individual, family and group.
• Provide reports and communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner, as required.
• Liaise with professionals in health, mental health, education, social care and voluntary sector services, as required.
• Work autonomously providing a specialist clinical service within the team.
• Ensure the regular use of routine outcomes as part of evaluating the impact of the clinical, consultation and other work offered.
• Have due regard for personal safety and that of children/carers, adhering to moving and handling regulations, restraining policies and ensuring safe positioning of self and others.
• Conform to the provisions of the Health and Safety Act and to comply with local statutory training including the appropriate level of Child Protection, on an annual basis or as required.

Whittington Health serves a richly diverse population and works hard to ensure that all our services are fair and equally accessible to everyone. We aim to employ a workforce which is as representative as possible of this population, so we are open to the value of differences in age, disability, gender, marital status, pregnancy and maternity, race, sexual orientation, and religion or belief. We are committed to providing a supportive environment and encouraging growth and learning within our team.

• Provide highly specialist mental health advice and consultation to social workers in Islington's CLA service for children and young people aged 0‑18 with a range of presentations and needs.
• Attend group supervision, sharing clinical and mental health knowledge and expertise to contribute to case discussion.
• Facilitate individual and joint consultations with social workers, supervising social workers and other professionals in the parenting team, to enhance trauma- and DDP-informed practice.
• Facilitate individual and joint consultations specifically focusing on reunification and repair of parent‑child relationships.
• Contribute to the development of the knowledge and skills of the CLA workforce and support embedding of the social work practice model.
• Provide specialist assessment and intervention for young people looked after, leaving care, their carers, families and professional networks, using evidence‑based and innovative ways of engagement and intervention (expected 20% of the job plan to direct clinical work).
• Formulate and devise clinical management plans for a range of specialist psychological interventions – individual, family and group.
• Produce high quality reports and communicate in a skilled and sensitive manner.
• Liaise with professionals in health, mental health, education, social care and voluntary sector services as required.
• Work autonomously providing a specialist clinical service within the team.
• Ensure routine outcome measures are used as part of evaluating the impact of clinical and consultation work.
• Maintain personal safety and safety of children/carers, following moving and handling regulations and restraining policies.
• Comply with the Health and Safety Act and local statutory training, including Child Protection, on an annual basis or as required.

• Attend regular clinical supervision and participate in team and service training, as required.
• Provide clinical supervision and line management of trainees and other CAMHS staff, as required by the team and service.
• Contribute to the pre- and post-qualification teaching of clinical staff.
• Continue developing skills in professional postgraduate teaching, training, consultation and supervision.

• Provide line management for junior clinicians within the service as required by the team managers.
• Contribute to the development, evaluation and monitoring of the team’s operational policies and services, using professional skills in research, service evaluation and audit.
• Advise service and professional management on psychological or organisational matters that require addressing.
• Participate in the recruitment, shortlisting and interviewing of CAMHS clinicians and assistant clinicians.
• Attend interagency meetings where appropriate to represent the team, offering guidance and ensuring service issues are noted and brought to the team manager.
• Assist in integration and development of user participation, outcomes measures, and evidence-based treatment approaches in line with the wider CAMHS strategy for service improvement.

• Utilise theory, evidence-based literature and research to support evidence-based practice in individual work and work with other team members.
• Contribute to service development and, where necessary, undertake research and provide research advice to staff.

• Demonstrate anti-discriminatory practice in all aspects of the role.
• Develop and maintain high personal standards of practice through CPD training and development programmes, in consultation with the line manager.
• Maintain up‑to‑date knowledge of legislation, national and local policies and issues relevant to the service and client group.
• Undertake other duties and responsibilities appropriate to the grade of the post, as may be agreed with Manager Community CAMHS.
• Respect Whittington’s ICARE values and Islington Vision and Priorities.

• Post-graduate qualification in Child & Adolescent Psychotherapy.
• Registration with a relevant professional body (UKCP, HCP, BAP, ACP).
• Experience of offering consultation and reflective practice to professionals outside mental health.
• Advanced training / qualifications such as Dyadic Development Psychotherapy, mentalisation-based approaches.
• Advanced clinical skills qualifications.
• Discipline‑specific supervisor training.

• Ability and skills to offer consultation to professionals individually and in group.
• Experience working with complex professional networks and children’s social care.
• Ability to work within a busy and challenging context, drawing on trauma-informed practice for self-care and to support social care colleagues.
• Skills in psychological assessment, formulation and interventions with looked after children.
• Experience in assessment and management of mental health risk.
• Ability to maintain appropriate clinical records and use electronic recording systems.
• Experience developing and delivering training.
• Ability to supervise a range of clinical and non-clinical staff, as required.
• Ability to form effective working relationships with a multidisciplinary and multi-agency context.
• Skills in a range of methods of psychological assessment, intervention and management of issues presented to CAMHS and adult mental health services.
• Ability to communicate effectively, orally and in writing with service users, their families, carers and professional colleagues within and outside the NHS.
• Interest and ability to contribute to service development.
• Ability to reflect on systemic issues.
• Experience working with parental / adult mental health.
• Skills in neurodevelopmental assessments.

• Minimum 2 years post-qualification experience of clinical work with young people looked after, leaving care and their carers.
• Extensive post-qualifying experience working with adolescents and young adults in a mental health setting.
• Experience delivering a mental health service in a social care or multiagency setting.
• Commitment to, and experience of, using feedback and outcome measures to assess impact.
• Knowledge of relevant clinical research literature on the impact of developmental trauma.
• Knowledge of relevant policy, practice and legislative frameworks.
• Knowledge and experience of reunification work with children and birth parents.
• Knowledge and experience of Developmental Dyadic Psychotherapy and its application in social work practice.
• Experience line managing clinical and/or non-clinical staff.
• Experience working with parental / adult mental health.

• Commitment to anti-discriminatory practice.
• Enthusiastic and creative approach to using clinical skills with clients, social care colleagues and the team.
• Passionate about working alongside social care colleagues to improve outcomes for children who have experienced care.
• Agreement to join our CAMHS CLA commitments.

• Ensure familiarity with and compliance with London Child Protection Procedures and protocols for children and young people.
• Ensure familiarity and compliance with London Multi Agency Safeguarding Vulnerable Adults Pan London Procedures.
• Ensure familiarity and compliance with local protocols and systems for information sharing.
• Know appropriate contact numbers and required reporting lines.
• Participate in required training and supervision.
• Comply with professional boundaries and codes of conduct.

Whittington Health is committed to safeguarding all children and vulnerable adults and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment. We would welcome applications from individuals who are from underrepresented groups in the organisation. This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.