Highly Specialist Occupational Therapist, IST (Stafford)

Posting date:	02 March 2026
Salary:	£47,810.00 to £54,710.00 per year
Additional salary information:	£47810.00 - £54710.00 a year
Hours:	Full time
Closing date:	16 March 2026
Location:	Stafford, ST16 3AG
Company:	NHS Jobs
Job type:	Permanent
Job reference:	C9301-26-0295

Summary

The IST is part of the Specialist Learning Disability Services and receives internal referrals from CLDT colleagues. The post requires interface with several teams and services to promote shared formulation. This includes assessment and management of risks which place the individual and others at risk of serious harm; or for whom the nature or degree of risk might otherwise lead to exclusion, placement breakdown, and admission to inpatient services. On occasion this may involve planned out of hours work, with access to on-call support and supervision, if the needs of an individual require it.Main Duties and Responsibilities 1. To support a shared clinical caseload of people with a learning disability and associated highly complex needs, including behaviours which are challenging. This will include caseload management and decisions on how to prioritise workload.2. To carry out specialist assessments including gathering complex information from service users, carers and other members of the multi-disciplinary team. This will include the use of specialist standardised and non-standardised assessment tools, verbal and non-verbal communication skills and observation of the service user in a variety of environments. 3. To advise on the delivery of a range of specific Occupational Therapy assessments and interventions by other OTs in the Intensive Support Team. Working closely with the Occupational Therapy CLDT Clinical Lead to align these with the Community Learning Disability Team assessment tools to enable clinical and caseload audit, understanding and reporting on any unmet need, training need and service development need.4. To contribute to formulation and the production of an overall care plan using specialised Occupational Therapy intervention. Negotiate and communicate these in the most suitable manner with the service user, family, carers and other members of the IST. The post holder will embed advanced sensory integration knowledge into practice and how this can impact occupational outcomes. 5. To implement, evaluate, analyse and adjust intervention according to individual needs, which will be highly complex. The frequent use of encouragement, motivation, negotiation, reassurance and training skills as well as discussing progress with service users, families and carers will be essential.6. Undertake core functional IST clinical pathway work when required to support service demands, with the aim of avoiding inappropriate hospital admissions, and placement / family breakdown. 7. To write and disseminate expert reports according to agreed protocols in line with local and national standards. Reports should be clear, accurate and easy to read containing appropriate language for service users, their family/carers and other professionals. Provide specialist advice via written or verbal instruction to clients, carers and relatives. This may also include health education, preventative or condition specific advice. To provide verbal and written reports for a variety of clinical meetings such as MDT meetings, LAEP meetings and CTRs, safeguarding meetings, multi-agency planning meetings and other meetings as and when required, contributing the ISTs perspective to the planning and delivery of care.8. To work flexibly with Occupational Therapists within the community teams ensuring that service users receive continuity of service from the most appropriate and best placed clinician. 9. To provide valuable OT insight contributing to the development, implementation, and evaluation of Positive Behaviour Support (PBS) Plans. 10. To participate in the delivery of intensive multi-disciplinary support and contribute to multi-disciplinary/multi-agency meetings, providing the specialist Occupational Therapy perspective. This will include presentation, verbal reporting and negotiating to achieve agreement on delivery of care.11. Utilise agreed outcome measures to review the effectiveness of interventions, as part of the care planning and evaluation process.12. To be responsible for participating in the maintenance and development of quality standards, including the auditing, monitoring and reviewing of practice in line with current clinical guidance practice and policy. To take part in and lead on clinical audit/research within own area of responsibility. This may include written and electronic communication across the whole trust and co-operative working with other disciplines. The post will require knowledge of audit methods and research methodology.13. To contribute to the planned discharge of service users from the service. This will involve analysis of the clinical situation and how the case should best be dealt with in the future. Liaison and communication with other members of the multi-disciplinary team and other agencies will be necessary.*Please see the attached JD/PS for further details*