Occupational Therapy Lead

An exciting opportunity has arisen for a registered Occupational Therapist to play a pivotal role in designing, developing and leading the OT provision in our regional Community Rehabilitation Enhanced Team (CREST).

Locations: Leeds, Calderdale, Kirklees, Wakefield, Bradford.

We are looking for a registered Occupational Therapist who is driven and passionate to be part of a busy and vital team developing the OT offer in supporting service users transitioning back to the community after lengthy admissions in complex (locked) rehab placements.

There is currently no OT provision within the team and so the successful candidate will be able to shape and create how Occupational Therapy can enhance and inform the support and interventions offered by the service to individuals with severe mental illness.

The role will offer autonomy, variety and development opportunities, both for leadership and clinical skills. The role will also offer flexibility, with the successful candidate able to benefit from a hybrid approach to working, if desired.

• The successful candidate will be responsible for the formulation, execution and evaluation of a care plan for a designated number of patients who may present with significant complexity within a multidisciplinary team.
• Assessment of the occupational therapy needs of the defined client group and establish and evaluate appropriate treatment programmes.
• Taking responsibility for identifying the specific interventions and skills required from the multidisciplinary team to deliver the plan of care and expected health/social outcomes which are evidence based and lead to recovery and minimise risk.
• Operating within the principles of recovery and as such supporting each patient to develop a recovery plan and reduce dependence on Secondary Mental Health Services. As part of this, the successful candidate will support a planned integration into local community facilities and discharge as part of the patient's recovery plan.
• This role does not include care co-ordination.

This lead role will involve line management of the wider occupational therapy team and other junior members of the team to ensure that the occupational therapy offer is evidence based, person-centred and meets the occupational needs of the service user.

The Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (LYPFT) is the main provider of Mental Health and Learning Disability services in Leeds. We also provide specialist inpatient services in York and some highly specialised services across the country. As a teaching trust with strong links to local universities, we are a centre of excellence for teaching, research and development.

There are many benefits of working for LYPFT including fantastic employee wellbeing support, 27 - 33 days annual leave, flexible working and remote working arrangements, the NHS Pension Scheme (LYPFT pays 20.6% into your scheme each year), coaching, support and opportunities for career development and training and education support alongside a range of exclusive discounts and payment schemes including for cars, extra leave days and more organisations such as Blue Light Card, Health Service Discounts and NHS Discount Offers.

We also have an incredible bank department, offering variety of roles in nursing, allied health professions, healthcare support worker and administration clerical. Permanent employees are automatically added to bank. Bank-only workers can choose the hours they want to work and will have the opportunity to gain additional experience, keep skills up to date, develop new ones and earn extra money without having to commit to a permanent role. For an informal discussion or more information please contact the teambankstaffingdepartment.lypft@nhs.net

You will be someone who can inspire and lead others, create hope and make positive connections to help people build a meaningful life in the community. You will make a real difference to people placed in complex (locked) rehabilitation hospitals by providing an alternative offer from the new regional community team. You will be at the forefront of developing an exciting new regional community rehabilitation service with contemporary Occupational Therapy interventions to help people get home.

This means that supporting discharge from hospital requires flexible and intensive transitional community support closer to home, in the least restrictive environment, providing consistent, recovery focussed and contemporary interventions and integrated pathways of care. Being multi-disciplinary and multi-agency in nature it will create psychologically informed flexible care packages to support discharge home.

The Complex Rehabilitation project is part of the West Yorkshire Integrated Care System (WYICS) Programme for Mental Health and Learning Disability. Consultation with service users, carer’s, commissioners, and mental health providers has highlighted the service user experience and challenges for people placed within mental health complex (locked) rehabilitation placements from West Yorkshire. Many people have experienced long lengths of stay in locked hospital placements, are disconnected from a community. Service users have shared very powerful experiences with us, describing a community model as “not just about keeping me safe – it’s about building a life worth living”.

If working in an innovative recovery focused team is something that you like the sound of, and you’d like additional information then please do get in contact to find out more about the role and CREST.

CREST is a part of the mental health complex rehabilitation pathway focused on providing different ways of working with individuals who have spent long periods of time in hospital. The service provides psychologically informed, flexible, individualised packages of care to build service user confidence to live a meaningful life in the community, as an alternative to a hospital complex rehabilitation placement. The service also facilitates system change by providing a consistent approach to community rehabilitation and safety planning that supports more hospital providers to make discharge decisions.

Our commitment to you if successful is that you will be offered strong support structures including reflective practice and clinical supervision, be supported to develop new skills, psychologically informed training and be supported by the WYICS project to evaluate of the service.

We recognise the importance of ensuring that our services are reflective of the communities we serve and champion diversity and inclusion. As part of a wider strategy to improve healthcare career opportunities for all, we would particularly welcome applicants from Black and Minority Ethnic (BAME) backgrounds. We are committed to implementing the NHS Workforce Race Equality Standards and welcome staff members from all racial backgrounds who commit to these standards.

Due to the nature of the service user group, there is a need for high levels of multi-agency working to ensure effective communication and maintaining high levels of care being delivered to service users on their recovery journey, and liaison with supported housing and other NHS and third sector organisations is something that the successful candidate will be required to undertake on a regular basis. The service is a regional service working across the West Yorkshire ICB.