Are you an Occupational Therapist wanting to work creatively to support people to overcome challenges and experience the life-changing power of Occupational Therapy? Are you passionate about person-centred care and team working to support people to live their best lives at home, at work, and in all their daily environments? Then this Learning Disabilities Occupational Therapy Band 5 position sounds like the right opportunity for you!
You will be joining an established Multi Disciplinary Team made up of Learning Disability Nurses, Physiotherapists, Clinical Psychologists, Speech and Language Therapists and Psychiatrists. The Team is dedicated to providing high quality care to meet the needs of the Learning Disability population across Knowsley and St Helen’s, and is based at Willis House, Cumber Lane, Whiston.
The clients on your caseload will all have a Learning Disability (LD) and may include those with multiple disabilities, complex communication difficulties, sensory needs, and behaviours that challenge. We are able to offer full induction, regular supervision, and ongoing in service training to support you to develop skills in each of these areas. This is a challenging but rewarding role and no two days are ever the same.
No experience of working with people with Learning Disabilities is needed, but a desire to work with this client group and a knowledge and understanding of their needs is important.
To work in people's own homes and a variety of community settings as a member of the St Helens and Knowsley Community Learning Disability Team, in conjunction with the Senior LD Occupational Therapists, providing occupational therapy assessment and treatment for adults with a learning disability, in accordance with the Valuing People principles of providing opportunities for people with learning disabilities for greater independence, choice, wellbeing, and control.
Assess, treat, and monitor the progress of the person with LD's occupational therapy treatment goals considering the holistic needs of the individual, and any relevant environmental factors using an occupational therapy frame reference.
To ensure all communication with the people with learning disabilities is in an appropriate format and, wherever possible, their occupational therapy plan and information is in a visual format.
Working in a Learning Disability service gives each of our Occupational Therapists opportunity to facilitate the development of the full range of function (physical, cognitive, interpersonal, and intrapersonal) in the occupational areas of productivity, self care, and leisure for persons with an LD, who have been referred to occupational therapy for assessment and treatment.
Mersey Care is one of the largest trusts providing physical health and mental health services in the North West, serving more than 1.4 million people across our region and are also commissioned for services that cover the North West, North Wales and the Midlands.
We offer specialist inpatient and community services that support physical and mental health and specialist inpatient mental health, learning disability, addiction and brain injury services. Mersey Care is one of only three trusts in the UK that offer high secure mental health facilities.
At the heart of all we do is our commitment to ‘perfect care’ – care that is safe, effective, positively experienced, timely, equitable and efficient. We support our staff to do the best job they can and work alongside service users, their families, and carers to design and develop future services together. We’re currently delivering a programme of organisational and service transformation to significantly improve the quality of the services we provide and safely reduce cost as we do so.
Flexible working requests will be considered for all roles.
Principal Responsibilities:
Clinical
1. To undertake comprehensive holistic assessments, devise treatment plans individualised to patient needs, reviewing and adapting during patient journey from initial assessment through to discharge.
2. To gain consent through engaging patients / clients through their therapy journey, enabling them to experience choice and as part of their recovery.
3. To prioritise designated Occupational Therapy referrals according to need, risk and service capacity.
4. To plan and implement patient centred individual and/or group interventions, using graded activity to achieve therapeutic goals including sensory integration difficulties within ward/rehab hub setting.
5. To monitor, evaluate and modify treatment in order to measure progress and ensure effectiveness of intervention.
6. To apply a high level of understanding of the effect of disability and provide training and advice on lifestyle changes and adaptations to the patient’s social and physical environment.
7. To provide clinical advice, expertise and leadership within your team.
8. To monitor and offer professional advice and leadership to all team members with regards to their caseloads and working practices.
9. To ensure that the service users care plan is developed to meet the assessed need of the individual. To monitor, via performance management, the care plans developed for service users by all sector members to ensure that they are appropriate and of a high standard.
10. To liaise with family members, carers, GP’s and other professionals as necessary when completing the assessment and developing a care plan.
11. To be a point of contact for service users and carers that have concerns regarding their care, making every effort to resolve their concerns sensitively and promptly, referring to and informing the Team Manager as necessary.
12. To develop a risk management plan for service users under your care, taking note of the contributions from other members of the team. Ensure that all significant people are aware of the risk management plan and are actioning it appropriately. To monitor and work with all team members to ensure that service user risk is managed appropriately and that risk management plans are of a high quality. Understanding risk assessment, being able to assess risk and complete management plans.
13. To lead the systematic monitoring and evaluation of service users under the care of the sector you have responsibility for.
14. Monitor and ensure high standards relating to the planning and delivery of Occupational Therapy activities and comply with The Royal College of Occupational Therapists Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct, contributing to good health and the importance of promoting these in line with organisational public health policy.
15. To monitor the provision of a range of therapeutic activities for service users by supervision of sector members’ caseloads and via audit.
16. To use skills gained through training and experience to de-escalate situations where service users become physically or verbally aggressive. Use your judgement, gained from experience, to establish if a service user requires assessment by a medic or possibly hospital admission.
17. To use skills gained through experience to deal with service users who become anxious, hostile or distressed.
18. To ensure all sector members get appropriate support following violent incidents and liaise with the Team Manager to ensure any identified actions arising from such incidents are implemented.
19. To participate in and/or lead service user reviews ensuring that service user needs are met and that the team has all the relevant information on which to base their clinical decisions.
20. To develop care plans that enable service users to reach and maintain their optimum level of health and independence to help them to remain in the community in their chosen setting or return to this on discharge.
21. To demonstrate an understanding of capacity and mental capacity Act.
Communication
1. To ensure a seamless approach by liaising with other professionals as required.
2. To promote awareness of the role of OT within the MDT negotiating priorities where appropriate.
3. To use verbal and non-verbal communication skills established through training and experience to impart sensitive information e.g., diagnosis or symptoms to service users and their families. To offer support to other staff to do this.
4. To demonstrate an awareness of effective communication and barriers to communication both verbal and non-verbal, awareness of access Language Line and visual impairment team, different aids to support patient care.
5. To use skills established through training and experience to give and receive information, adhering to the Caldicott guidelines, to other individuals with regard to a service user’s care in reviews and multi-disciplinary meetings. These individuals may be external to the Trust.
6. To attend / contribute to multi-disciplinary team meetings / Safety huddle / SAFER.
7. Communicate effectively and form professional relationships with patients, their relatives and visitors, staff and any other relevant contact.
Documentation
1. To ensure that up to date written and electronic records and activity data are maintained in accordance with Professional and Trust standards and provide specialist OT reports relevant to practice setting.
2. To ensure that all relevant information with regards to a service user’s care and treatment is documented accurately and legibly into the health record. Supervise and monitor the entries made by sector members through performance management and audit.
Professional Ethics
1. To adhere to the Trust Policy on Confidentiality.
2. To comply with the COT Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct and national and local policies and procedures.
3. To undertake all duties with due regard to sensitive information and confidentiality in line with Trust Policy and Procedure.
4. At all times to be a positive ambassador for Occupational Therapy and the wider service.
Leadership, Supervision & Appraisal
1. To provide effective guidance, supervision and appraisals for junior staff and students as required.
2. In line with local guidelines review and reflect on own practice and performance through effective use of professional and operational supervision and appraisal.
3. To participate in clinical and management supervision.
4. To be responsible for the update and maintenance of a personal development portfolio.
5. To be fully involved in training initiatives and be able to plan and implement in specific Occupational Therapy Training to other staff when required.
Training Staff & Students
1. To contribute to the provision of teaching sessions in order to pass on knowledge and skills.
2. To lead in the induction, training of students and other staff both within or external to the Trust.
3. To be responsible for the supervision and written assessment of OT students on practice placement within the Trust.
Service Development & Delivery
1. To provide reports and statistical returns to a variety of departments as requested.
2. To participate in the operational planning, and implementation of policy and service development within your team, leading on delegated projects within your team.
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