Job summary
- Main area
- Band 5 Occupational Therapist
- Grade
- NHS AfC: Band 5
- Contract
- Permanent
- Hours
- Full time - 37.5 hours per week
- Job ref
- 455-NLFT-0276
- Employer
- North London NHS Foundation Trust
- Employer type
- NHS
- Site
- Dennis Scott Unit
- Town
- London
- Salary
- £35,763 - £43,466 Per annum + outer London HCAS
- Salary period
- Yearly
- Closing
- 05/08/2025 23:59
Employer heading
Occupational Therapist
NHS AfC: Band 5
Thank you for your interest in the North London NHS Foundation Trust (NLFT). This is an exciting time to join us and be part of our journey to improve mental health care across North London and deliver excellent services to our local people. We will achieve this through the North London Way, as we:
- Collaborate at every level by living our values to create the right conditions for us all to work together.
- Develop our new Trust culture, to help make our new Trust a great place to work and to receive great care.
- Empower our teams to lead the planned improvements in our services, by skilling them and giving them the tools to make the changes.
- Focus on delivering excellence at every level to improve our performance and ensure consistently high-quality care across all our services.
- Ensure that research, quality improvement, and technology lead the way and are embedded in our services.
- Take a trauma informed approach to everything we do
We proactively welcome diversity in our workforce and pride ourselves on being an inclusive employer. We aim to recruit from our local communities and provide opportunities to all including apprenticeships, veterans, care leavers and more.
The North London Way to deliver: Better Mental Health, Better Lives, Better Communities.
Our trust website is: https://www.northlondonmentalhealth.nhs.uk/
Job overview
The post holder will hold a case load and work as an Occupational Therapist (OT) across the three acute mental health wards in Dennis Scott Unit, to provide assessment, plan and implement interventions, evaluate treatment and ensure safe discharge.
Main duties of the job
The post holder will work with service users on the wards who have complex and substantial needs, often with dual diagnosis and coexisting conditions including physical health needs. The post holder will provide specialist occupational therapy assessments and offer a strength based, recovery focused approach with the aim of enhancing daily living skills, and engagement in meaningful and purposeful activities for service users on the wards. The post holder is expected to work closely with the Multi-Disciplinary Teams (MDT) and relevant outside agencies, as well as with other occupational therapists and the activities coordinators within the team to provide a quality service, which is responsive to patients’ occupational needs. The post holder will provide specific time limited interventions with clear goals established with the service user and in conjunction with the supporting clinical team.
Working for our organisation
Why choose to join the North London NHS Foundation Trust?
We believe that by working together, our Trust can achieve more for the residents of North Central London and our patients than we can by working apart.
Our Five-Year Strategy:
1. We will provide consistently high-quality care closer to home.
2. With our partners in North London and each borough we will ensure equity of outcome for all
3. We will offer great places to work, providing staff with supportive environment to deliver outstanding care.
4. We will be more effective as an organisation by pioneering research, quality improvement and technology.
Why NLFT?
· Transforming and creating a positive environment for our service users, staff and visitors.
- We develop and retain our staff through leadership behaviours and managers programme and many more opportunities.
- We promote flexible working and support staff with a range of health and wellbeing initiatives.
- NHS Discounts, generous annual leave allowance and NHS pension scheme
- We have excellent internal staff network support groups.
The postholder will need to be comfortable working in an environment of complex matrix management arrangements and will at all times behave and align with our Trusts’ values and cultural pillars:
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
Please kindly refer to the job description and person specification that is attached to the vacancy profile.
Person specification
Education and Qualifications
Essential criteria
- Dip. COT or BSc OT
- Registered with HCPC
- Evidence of Continuous Professional Development
Desirable criteria
- Mandatory Training e.g. Breakaway / PMVA training; Information governance
Experience
Essential criteria
- Pre-registration experience of mental health settings and or working with people with mental health conditions
- Experience of group and individual interventions
- Experience of working with MDT
- Experience of relating to people form a range of social and ethnic backgrounds
- Experience of using electronic patient records
- Experience of using different functional assessments and activity analysis to formulate patient interventions
Desirable criteria
- Experience of using MOHO assessments e.g. MOHOST, OSA
- Experience of caseload management
- Experience of supervising OT Student and/or junior staff
- Experience of working towards OT service development
- Experience of Quality Improvement
- Experience with external network involvement
- Experience with simple equipment provision
Knowledge and Skills
Essential criteria
- Demonstrates knowledge in the application of relevant OT theoretical models, approaches and processes relevant to people with mental health conditions
- Demonstrates knowledge of Mental Health conditions and the Mental Health Act
- Demonstrates professional approach, including boundary keeping, to relationships with staff and patients
- Effective verbal communication skills and written communication skills when completing reports, assessments, care plans supervision
- Effective time management skills
- Ability to act on constructive criticism and reflect on own practice
- Ability to sustain demands of working with a challenging and emotive patient group
Desirable criteria
- Ability to use a range of treatment skills and apply these to individual or group interventions
- Demonstrates clinical reasoning skills to assess and address patients’ needs (including risk assessment) and guide interventions
- Up to date knowledge of developments effecting OT practice
- Knowledge of and ability to apply national policies and procedures including, but not limited to confidentiality, consent, risk management, service user involvement
- Knowledge of Quality Improvement
- Proactive team member and willingness to contribute towards OT service development
Personal Qualities
Essential criteria
- Ability and commitment to work as a team member
- Ability to be flexible and adaptable to manage fluctuating work demands
- Aware of own limitations and needs, ability to seek advice and support appropriately and actively develop themselves
- Empathic and considerate towards patients and carers
- Ability to maintain boundaries and form positive therapeutic relationships with service users and carers
- Act in a way that support equality and diversity
Desirable criteria
- Ability to promote self and profession
- Passionate about service user involvement and working with expert by experience
- Ability to inspire hope, support recovery and make a difference
Other Requirements
Essential criteria
- Willing to work at flexible hours according to service needs
Employer certification / accreditation badges
Applicant requirements
You must have appropriate UK professional registration.
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.
Documents to download
Further details / informal visits contact
- Name
- Jessica Lashko
- Job title
- OT & AHP Lead
- Email address
- [email protected]
- Additional information
Hilar Poon
Senior Occupational Therapist
0208 702 3486
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