Senior Specialist Nurse

We are the Islington Community Mental Health Team (CMHT), a highly motivated multi-disciplinary team focused on working together to support our service users to improve their quality of life. Our service users are older adults with severe mental illness and frailty, or dementia with behaviour that challenges.

We provide holistic interventions and work with service users and their families/carers to ensure they are at the heart of everything we do.

We are looking to recruit a Senior Specialist Nurse who has strong clinical and leadership skills, who shares our passion to strive towards excellence in older people's mental health and dementia care, and has a keen interest in service development and improvement.

Main duties of the job

You will carry a caseload of the most complex service users in the service, and provide senior nursing leadership and consultation to nurses and other professionals. You will, therefore, be required to have significant clinical skills and knowledge underpinned by experience and specialist training/academic study.

You will lead on the assessment of physical health care needs of service users and ensure that on-going physical health monitoring is undertaken as per Trust policy.

You will ensure practices are in place that support learning and development across the team.

You will work with the Team and Service Manager to foster a culture of curiosity, empowerment, and service improvement.

Job responsibilities

As the Senior Nurse in the team, you will:

1. Carry a small caseload of the most complex service users in the service.
2. Lead on the delivery of nursing interventions to support service users' physical and mental wellbeing.
3. Provide direct supervision to nurses and other health professionals within the CMHT.
4. Lead on nursing professional development.
5. Organise/deliver specialist training to nurses and other members of the MDT.
6. Work closely with the Consultant, Team Manager, and Service Manager to ensure care is delivered in accordance with national policies and best practice guidelines.
7. Promote a culture that fosters staff involvement and a progressive attitude to service improvement.

Person Specification Education/Qualifications

• Diploma or degree leading to professional Registered qualification in Mental Health or Substance Misuse Services.
• Current registration with relevant professional body.
• Evidence of recent and or ongoing post registration academic study relevant to practice.
• Masters Degree in related field.

Knowledge / Experience

• Significant clinical management experience in mental health or substance misuse service delivery.
• Extensive and sound knowledge base in the provision of mental health or substance misuse services and preferred treatment methods.
• Demonstrable and extensive experience of managing and leading others in a clinical/team setting.
• Sound practical experience of patient/service user care and engagement within the wider context of the organisation.

Skills / Abilities

• Ability to communicate both in verbal and written form at a high level in a range of complex areas.
• Experience of negotiating with a range of stakeholders.
• Well developed leadership skills with the ability to enthuse, motivate and involve team members.
• Experience of supporting staff through change and fostering a culture of continuous service improvement.
• Previous supervisory experience.
• Experience of undertaking audits and supporting research.

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

£54,320 to £60,981 a year per annum Inclu Inner London HCAS.