Principal Psychologist in ICU
Closing date: 16 June 2026
This post offers the opportunity to work closely with the Critical Care Rehabilitation Team at Midland Metropolitan University Hospital, alongside providing supervision to the Psychologist at Russell's Hall Hospital. The role sits within a passionate and highly valued multidisciplinary team committed to ensuring patients receive comprehensive rehabilitation and psychological follow-up following admission to Critical Care.
The role includes:
- Attending MDT ward rounds to identify and assess psychological needs following Critical Care admission
- Providing 1:1 therapeutic interventions for inpatients recovering from Intensive Care
- Offering consultation and psychological expertise to ward teams and the wider MDT
- Liaising with, and referring to, community services including GPs and Community Mental Health Teams to support continuity of care following discharge
- Contributing to service development, pathway innovation, and psychologically informed approaches within Critical Care Rehabilitation
- Supporting staff wellbeing and providing psychologically informed consultation to teams working in high-intensity settings
- Contributing to audit, service evaluation, teaching, and training opportunities across the service
Main duties of the job
- Provides highly specialist psychological assessment of clients with highly complex and contentious conditions based on the appropriate use, interpretation and integration of data from a variety of sources, which may include neuropsychological testing.
- Responsible for recognising the potential for or signs of client harm, abuse or neglect, including poor clinical practice, reporting all such concerns and taking all reasonable steps to protect the client. Responsible for identifying and reporting concerns regarding the safeguarding of children who may be at risk.
- Undertakes risk assessment and risk management for individual clients and provides highly specialist advice to other professionals on psychological aspects of risk assessment and risk management and the high physical risks inherent in the client group.
- Formulates plans for highly specialist psychological therapy and/or management of clients' mental health conditions based upon an appropriate conceptual framework and evidence-based practice. Negotiates the implementation of such plans with clients and/or their carers.
- Implements a range of highly specialist psychological therapies for individual clients, carers, families and groups, adjusting and refining psychological formulations as required.
- Undertakes highly skilled evaluations and makes decisions about treatment options.
About us
Our Clinical Health Psychology Service supports people to adapt to and develop creative ways of living with physical health conditions. The service currently operates across Dudley, Wolverhampton, and Sandwell & West Birmingham, delivering a range of specialist contracts across these localities.
We welcome applications from experienced clinicians with a background in physical health settings. However, we are equally keen to hear from applicants working in other specialties who can demonstrate transferable skills and a strong interest in clinical health psychology. We particularly value applicants who demonstrate excellent communication skills, creativity, and the ability to work collaboratively within multidisciplinary settings.
You will join a supportive and enthusiastic team of practitioner psychologists and psychological professionals who utilise a broad range of therapeutic approaches. There are excellent opportunities for continuing professional development and supervision across a variety of models, including EMDR, psychodynamic, attachment-based, humanistic, and third-wave approaches.
As a Principal Psychologist, you will be supported by a Consultant Clinical Psychologist within a robust leadership, supervision, and operational management structure. The service is committed to supporting professional development and leadership progression, with opportunities to contribute to supervision, teaching, and wider service initiatives.
Job responsibilities
- 2.0 Supervisory/Professional Responsibility
- Clinical supervision of Trainee Applied Psychologists and Assistant Psychologists
- Supervises Band 7 and 8a Applied Psychologists
- Specialist psychological supervision and scaffolding in a care pathway/cluster
- Line manage Assistant Psychologists
- Will hold responsibility and accountability for their own actions, ensuring appropriate support and supervision is sought when required.
- Maintain CPD and keep abreast of current developments in this field through reading, attendance at training courses, and other CPD activities, ensuring log kept in line with HCPC requirements.
- Contribute to teaching offered on the local Applied Psychology training courses.
- 3.0 Multi-Disciplinary Training and Development
- Work with members of the multidisciplinary team to develop and maintain psychologically minded ways of understanding and working with clients, promoting and maintaining the mental health and coping strategies of the clients and maintaining the safety of clients and staff.
- Provide highly specialist advice, guidance and consultation to other direct care staff in MDT.
- Provide clinical supervision to other direct care staff in MDT.
- Ensure appropriate clinical supervision and scaffolding is in place to enable embedding of psychological skills in relation to a specific care pathway/cluster.
- Assesses the need for and develops a plan for training in psychological interventions for the team in relation to a specific care pathway/cluster.
- Devises and delivers training to staff which may include those outside immediate MDT in consultation with Consultant Applied Psychologist.
- 4.0 Service and Organisational Development
- Clinically leads MDT in development, implementation and monitoring of MD care plans/ pathways/clusters.
- Takes a lead role in MDT delivery of CQUIN and QIP projects, NICE benchmarking and compliance requirements as required within MDT.
- Able to identify service priorities and work with Consultant Applied Psychologist and/or Service Managers to develop these into action plans.
- 5.0 Service Redesign and Cultural Change
- Bring an understanding of psychological change processes to own role within MDT and help MDT to cope with changes, in consultation with Consultant Applied Psychologist.
- Help Team/Service Managers to devise suitable plans for change.
- Represent a psychological perspective in regular specific Division-wide forums around governance, quality and redesign under guidance from Consultant Applied Psychologist.
Person Specification
Education/Qualifications
- Post-graduate doctoral level training in applied Psychology (or its equivalent) as accredited by the BPS including models of psychopathology, clinical psychometrics and neuropsychology, two or more distinct psychological therapies and lifespan developmental psychology.
- HCPC registration as an Applied Psychologist with Chartered Status.
- Trained in clinical supervision and the supervision of doctoral trainees.
Experience
- Working as a qualified applied psychologist within the designated service including a wide variety of client groups, across the whole life course and a range of clinical severity across a range of care settings.
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.
Black Country Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust
