Clinical Nurse Specialist Lead for Personality Disorder – Primary Care
The closing date is 08 April 2026.
Specialist Nurse Practitioner – Relational & Emotional Difficulties Service (REDS)
Are you a reflective, compassionate, and highly motivated nurse who thrives on building meaningful therapeutic relationships? Do you enjoy working collaboratively across systems to support people with complex emotional needs? If so, we’d love to hear from you.
We are seeking a Specialist Nurse Practitioner to join the Relational and Emotional Difficulties Service (REDS) – a psychologically led pathway, sat within the Personality Disorder Pathway, supporting individuals in primary care who experience significant challenges with emotional regulation and relationships. Many of the people we work with present with traits or a diagnosis of personality disorder, typically of moderate severity.
Why Join Us?
This is a unique opportunity to work at the interface of primary care and specialist psychological services, shaping how the system responds to people with complex emotional needs. You’ll be part of a warm, reflective, and forward-thinking team that values curiosity, compassion, and high‑quality care.
Main Duties of the Job
About the Service
REDS is a dynamic, multidisciplinary team comprising psychologists, psychological therapists, assistant psychologists, specialist liaison nurses, and dedicated support staff. We work in partnership with CPSL MIND, who co‑facilitate a number of our treatment groups. We work closely with the Personality Disorder Community Service, ensuring a coherent and compassionate approach across the system.
In this role, you will be embedded within the Cambridge Primary Care Network, working across 22 GP practices. You’ll become a trusted link between primary care and REDS, helping to ensure that people with complex emotional needs receive thoughtful, well‑coordinated support.
About You
We’re looking for someone who is:
* Confident and knowledgeable in working with personality disorder and complex emotional needs.
* Skilled at prioritising and managing a varied workload across multiple sites (this is a hybrid role).
* Thoughtful, collaborative, and committed to psychologically informed practice.
* Keen to contribute to service development and to be an active voice within a passionate, supportive team.
About Us
Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust is a health and social care organisation dedicated to providing high‑quality care with compassion to improve the health and wellbeing of the people we care for, as well as supporting and empowering them to lead a fulfilling life.
Our clinical teams deliver many NHS services, not only via inpatient and primary care settings, but also within the community. These services include children’s, adult and older people’s mental health, forensic and specialist mental health, learning disabilities, primary care and liaison psychiatry, substance misuse, social care, research and development.
As an equal opportunities employer, we encourage applications from all sectors of the community, particularly from under‑represented groups including people with long‑term conditions and members of our ethnic minority and LGBTQ+ communities.
Please be advised we reserve the right to close adverts earlier than the closing date should we receive sufficient applications.
Regrettably, we cannot offer sponsorship for all our job roles. If you apply for a role that we cannot offer sponsorship for, unfortunately, your application form will be rejected from the process.
For further information on CPFT, please visit our website at www.cpft.nhs.uk.
Job Responsibilities
Please refer to the attached job description and person specification for full details of responsibilities.
What You’ll Be Doing
This is a varied and influential role where your clinical expertise will make a real difference. Key responsibilities include:
* Supporting GPs and primary care teams through consultation, advice, guidance, and training.
* Indirect clinical work: Offering psychologically informed formulation, treatment, and management suggestions for individual patients.
* Contributing to and leading virtual forums for wider agencies to strengthen system‑wide understanding and management of personality‑related difficulties.
* Attending virtual GP clinics alongside PCMHS colleagues to help shape care planning for people with complex emotional needs.
* Providing supervision to PCMH practitioners, supporting high‑quality assessments and referrals into REDS.
* Acting as a crucial liaison between primary care and REDS, offering feedback on referrals and contributing to service development.
* Supporting and guiding junior REDS practitioners and participating actively in REDS team meetings and clinical discussions.
* Providing prescribing and deprescribing support at a primary care level, for those experiencing difficulties associated with personality disorder or who have a diagnosed personality disorder. This includes responding to requests for advice and guidance from primary care and may involve reviewing and directly prescribing/deprescribing, within the clinician’s scope of practice.
Please note for this role you will be required to travel independently around the county meeting strict time deadlines. You will need to hold a full UK driving licence* and have use of a vehicle. You cannot use public transport for this role as this is not a reliable form of transport and will not allow you to meet service needs. Please confirm in your application that you meet the specified criteria.
*DVLA have a number of reciprocal arrangements with overseas countries, for further information please visit the DVLA website.
Person Specification
Education/Qualifications
* NMC registration
* Non‑Medical Prescribing. Demonstrated practice and supervision of prescribing
* Qualification and experience in systemic practice.
Experience
* In‑depth experience as a senior professional or manager
* Evidence of successful working within multidisciplinary team
* Evidence of managing workload and ability to prioritise
* Evidence of clinical supervision training and/or experience
* Experience of working with wider stakeholder groups
* Experience in research and service evaluation work
* Experience with delivering training
Skills & Abilities
* Demonstrable commitment and enthusiasm for working with personality disorder
* Evidence of leadership ability, able to influence, involve and develop individuals and teams
* Decision making and problem‑solving skills
* Experience in managing feedback, investigation of complaints or similar
* Able to demonstrate initiative and be proactive
* Committed to personal and team developmentEvidence of continuing professional development
Physical Requirements
* Ability to travel independently around the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough area meeting required timescales. A full driving licence and access to a vehicle is essential.
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.
Address
Chesterton Medical Centre, 35 Union Lane, Chesterton.
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