Band 6 Practitioner - Bristol

Calling all detectives, this is where your detective skills really count. An opportunity has arisen to join the ASCC Advice and Support in Custody and Court team on a fixed term/secondment opportunity for 12 months.

Working in Police Custody suite you will need all your clinical experience to work out what is going on for a detainee. Your assessment of the detainee can determine the course of action taken by the investigating officer in the case. ASCC is an all age, all vulnerability service working in Police Custody Suites at both Patchway and Keynsham as well as offering services to the Magistrates Courts.

The service works closely with the Police and other Criminal Justice Services and professionals to ensure the most effective pathway.

We welcome candidates with a professional registered body (including OT, Social worker, Learning Disability Nurse and RMN), with experience of working within a variety of mental health services.

• To attend Custody suites, and provide mental health assessments, advice and identify robust care pathways, for individuals where a potential vulnerability need has been identified.
• The ability to carry out assessments and prepare comprehensive health and social circumstances reports where indicated in a specified time frame.
• To work closely and build links with all referring agencies acting as a single point of contact within the Criminal Justice System.
• To refer onto appropriate services for the identified needs of the service user.
• Where diversion is indicated, to facilitate Mental Health Act assessments.
• To refer to the prison mental health teams where custody is indicated ensuring appropriate information is received along the care pathway
• To be responsible for adhering to all Trust Policies and procedures.
• To possess a good working knowledge of the Integrated Care Programme Approach (ICPA), including the ability to formulate a risk assessment and risk management plan.

We are AWP (Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust) a diverse organisation with over 5,000 dedicated staff providing inpatient and community-based mental health care. We provide services from a range of locations to approximately 1.8 million people living in Bath and North East Somerset (B&NES), Bristol, North Somerset, South Gloucestershire, Swindon, across the county of Wiltshire and in parts of Dorset. Our outstanding people promote mental health and wellbeing. The expertise and resources within AWP are dedicated to a person-centred approach for those who use our services and for all employees. We recognise that happy and fulfilled employees give better care.

At AWP we actively encourage applicants from all backgrounds; we are particularly keen to encourage applications from people from Black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds, those with disabilities and from the LGBTQ+ community. We want people to bring their unique blend of experiences, backgrounds, perspectives and knowledge to AWP, as diversity makes us stronger.

The appointed individual will need to be responsive to the rapid timescales that the custody imposes and the environmental constraints within the holding cells. Individuals will have been recently arrested and may as a result present as acutely distressed with a range of complex needs.
The individual will be working alongside a broad range of differing professionals, therefore an ability to communicate across the spectrum and represent the needs of the specific client group within the environment will be a specific challenge to this potholder.
The ability to form good working relationships to aid robust care pathways is essential, as is the ability to work with a complex and often culturally diverse client group.