Therapy Assistant

A warm welcome awaits you to join us at Northamptonshire Healthcare Foundation Trust (NHFT) as a therapy assistant supporting the occupational therapy (OT) and physiotherapy staff within the in-patient mental health service. We have full time and part time posts available at the Welland Centre, Kettering and Berrywood Hospital, Northampton.

The therapy team work closely alongside nursing staff and the wider multi-disciplinary team to provide quality and effective care for our patients with mental health conditions such as depression, anxiety, psychosis, and dementia.

Patients are in hospital 24 hours a day and therefore flexible working patterns across the week may be required to meet service need.

Main duties of the job

You will be working across the in-patient acute mental health wards for adults and/or older people under the direction and support of the occupational therapists and physiotherapists. You will be undertaking assessments and providing individual and group treatments enabling individuals to undertake day to day tasks which may be compromised by their mental and physical health.

The focus of treatments will include aspects such as daily living skills; social skills; mobility and range of movement; balance, strength and endurance; problem solving; confidence and self-esteem. The aim is to enable each individual to re-build (or slow deterioration of) daily living and coping skills to return to independent or supported living that meets their personal goals, quality of life and safety.

If you have existing practical skills and hobbies (for example pottery, woodworking, gardening) that you can use as therapeutic activities with patients, that would be advantageous. Good levels of English (written and verbal) and computer literacy are essential, as well as a positive outlook to promote person centred and recovery focused care.

Please note the vacancy may close early once a maximum number of applications has been reached.

To help us assess your suitability for the role, please provide answers based on your own knowledge, experience and examples. If you have used Artificial Intelligence (AI) to support your application, please declare this within your submission.

An initial round of online interviews will be scheduled for 5th August, following which successful candidates will be invited to a further face to face interview at Berrywood Hospital on 12th August.

NHFT is an integrated primary care and mental health Trust, providing physical, mental health and specialty services in both hospital settings and out in the community.

NHFT promotes a culture of learning to improve the care and safety of our patients and staff, which focuses on people who enable our Trust to be 'outstanding' by supporting opportunity, innovation, development and growth.