Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust celebrates diversity and promotes equal opportunities; we are committed to challenging and eliminating racism and other forms of discrimination and advancing and promoting equality of opportunity in the provision of services and creating an inclusive environment for all employees. We believe that everyone has the right to be treated with dignity and respect.
We take positive action to support disadvantaged groups and also particularly encourage applications from ethnically diverse, disabled and LGBTQIA+ people that are under-represented in our workforce. Furthermore we welcome applications from reservists and ex-armed forces personnel as we recognise the benefits of the values, skills, training and experience that they bring to their work with us. We encourage all applicants to share their equality information with us.
Job overview
Join Our Growing Team at North and Mid-Mersey First Response Services!
Are you a compassionate and committed support worker looking to make a real difference? We're expanding our First Response Services and are looking for dedicated individuals to join our dynamic team.
In this vital role, you'll support individuals experiencing crisis by helping them access the right support, achieve positive outcomes, and develop safety plans alongside our clinical staff. You'll play a key part in:
* Providing guidance, information, and signposting to appropriate services
* Handling referrals from professionals, families, and carers
* Assisting clinical teams with urgent assessments
* Empowering service users to take an active role in their care and recovery
If you're passionate about supporting others and thrive in a fast-paced, collaborative environment, we'd love to hear from you.
Shortlisted applicants will be invited to attend our recruitment event taking place on 7 and 10 July 2025.
Main duties of the job
To carry out assigned duties, involving supporting and signposting service users, family, carers and other professionals under the guidance and indirect supervision of a qualified nurse.
To report to the qualified nurse any concerns observations made whilst providing care to service-users.
To take part in a 24 hour system of rostering including internal rotation.
Working for our organisation
Mersey Care is one of the largest trusts providing physical health and mental health services in the North West, serving more than 1.4 million people across our region and are also commissioned for services that cover the North West, North Wales and the Midlands.
We offer specialist inpatient and community services that support physical and mental health and specialist inpatient mental health, learning disability, addiction and brain injury services. Mersey Care is one of only three trusts in the UK that offer high secure mental health facilities.
At the heart of all we do is our commitment to 'perfect care' - care that is safe, effective, positively experienced, timely, equitable and efficient. We support our staff to do the best job they can and work alongside service users, their families, and carers to design and develop future services together. We're currently delivering a programme of organisational and service transformation to significantly improve the quality of the services we provide and safely reduce cost as we do so.
Flexible working requests will be considered for all roles.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
Clinical
To contribute to the assessment and delivery of a planned programme of care under the guidelines of ECC and with guidance and indirect supervision from the qualified practitioner.
To support individuals so that they are able to recognise, cope and self-manage with crisis situations and to help them develop independence where possible.
To contribute to the effective running of the service by providing and receiving information to/from other departments. Ensure this information is provided in the most effective way i.e. telephone, fax or in writing.
To use a variety of verbal and non-verbal skills to overcome communication barriers presented by service-users due to their mental health needs.
To contribute to maintaining a safe environment for service users in the community.
To carry out specific duties that contribute to the assessment of service-users as requested by a qualified practitioner.
To develop and maintain links with other agencies and services, both statutory and voluntary.
To contribute to the development of risk management plans for service users by reporting, to the qualified practitioner, any incidents of risk to the service user or risk to others as a result of the behaviour or actions of service users.
Professional
To participate in the Directorates performance management/supervision framework and work towards meeting identified goals and objectives as agreed in a PACE.
To act, at all times, in accordance with Trust policies and procedures.
To undertake mandatory training as stipulated by the Trust and ensure that all interactions with service users are in line with this e.g. Manual Handling.
Under the guidance and supervision of a qualified practitioner, to make accurate and appropriate entries into health records.
To participate in staff meetings to assist effective two-way communication.
To seek advice and further training, if appropriate, before carrying out any duty you are unsure of.
To make the qualified practitioner aware of any incidents arising during your span of duty and carry out any actions arising from this as directed.
Take direction from the qualified practitioner as to any duties or tasks assigned to you for your span of duty and carry them out as requested.
To participate, as directed in the induction of new staff.
Organisational
To adhere to the Trusts rights based approach taking into account service user choice.
To take responsibility for ensuring your own personal safety and that of the service user when using equipment.
To take reasonable care for the health and safety of yourself and any others that may be affected by your acts and omissions at work.
To ensure that you are familiar with the terms and conditions of your post.
To participate in service development activities as required.
Other
To maintain the dignity of service users at all times whilst dealing with aspects of personal care.
To seek appropriate advice and support from the qualified practitioner during occasions when service users or their carers become agitated or distressed.
To maintain service user confidentiality at all times both on and off duty.
To maintain appropriate professional boundaries with service users at all times both on and off duty.
To ensure that work is conducted in accordance with the Trusts Equality and Diversity Strategy.
In exceptional circumstances to co-operate with reasonable requests from more senior staff to vary your area of work to meet unplanned clinical need.
Person specification
Knowledge/ Experience
Essential criteria
* Experience of working in a care setting
* Understanding of issues of confidentiality
Desirable criteria
* Experience of individuals with mental health problems or personal lived experience of mental health problems
Qualifications
Essential criteria
* Health and Social Care Level 2 qualification or equivalent experience
Desirable criteria
* Care Certificate
* Phlebotomy trained
* Physical Health competency basic passport
* MEWS
* Level 2 Smoking Cessation
* Good standard of education
* Qualification in craft, domestic skills, leisure or health equivalent to City & Guild Part 1, or 2 year experience working in a health setting
* Willing to work towards Level 3 Health Care qualification
Skills
Essential criteria
* Able to communicate effectively
* Ability to work as a member of a team
* Ability to demonstrate a non-judgemental attitude
* Ability to work on own initiative under the supervision of a qualified practitioner
* Ability to provide support and guidance to junior staff
Please ensure you check the email account from which you apply for all correspondence. All information regarding your application will come from apps.trac.jobs not NHS Jobs.
Only those applicants who demonstrate clearly how they meet our person specification will be shortlisted for interview.
As a Disability Confident Employer, we offer a guaranteed interview scheme for applicants who consider themselves to be disabled who meet the minimum (essential) criteria for the role in the person specification. If you would like your application to be considered under the Trust's guaranteed interview scheme you can indicate this in the personal information section of your online application form.
Should you require a reasonable adjustment to our recruitment process please email recruitment@merseycare.nhs.uk to ensure that measures can be put in place to support you.
We reserve the right to close any vacancies from further applications when we have received a minimum number of applications from which to make a shortlist. Please ensure you apply without delay if you wish to be considered for this role.
The Trust expects all post holders who require an enhanced DBS for their role subscribe to the DBS Update Service. You will be required to enrol for this service for a fee of £16 per year and maintain registration. Trans applicants who require a DBS check and do not want to reveal details of their previous identity can contact the DBS Sensitive Applications Team (01516761452 or email sensitive@dbs.gsi.gov.uk) with their application number once they have completed their DBS application form. The team can prevent any previous identity showing on the DBS Certificate, unless the applicant has a conviction under their previous details in which case this will need to be disclosed.
Applicants requiring sponsorship may wish to determine the likelihood of obtaining sponsorship for this position by assessing themselves against the criteria on the gov.uk website -
Flexible working requests will be considered for all roles.
Please be advised that the use of Artificial Intelligence on applications is monitored and if you choose to use this, you must declare this on your application form.
Please note: new entrants to the NHS will commence on the first pay point of the relevant band.
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
* Job Description & Person Specification (PDF, 171.7KB)
* OH Risk ID (PDF, 384.6KB)
* A Great Place to Work (PDF, 2.1MB)
* Our People Promise and Charter (PDF, 5.8MB)
* Employee Benefits (PDF, 950.7KB)
* Your Recruitment Journey (PDF, 291.0KB)