Counsellor, Senior

Funded under the Healthy Communities Initiative, the Integrated Alcohol Service is a community-based team, which will deliver counselling, and psycho-educational interventions with adults with problematic alcohol use, provide family support, and develop integrated alcohol treatment pathways. This team will be integrated with an Addiction Service (funded separately) based in the acute hospital and community, who will liaise between the hospital and the community-based team and enhance the integrative aspect of the service, and will develop links, shared care and integrated care pathways with other HSE services in HSE West and North and those working in the community, statutory and voluntary sector.

· Integrated Alcohol Service delivers therapeutic interventions to individuals and families affected by substance misuse in multiple locations across the region

· The Service supports the provision of an integrated range of preventative, therapeutic and rehabilitation services to meet the diverse health and social care needs of service-users in an accountable, accessible and equitable manner.

· The strategic objectives of the Service, in-line with the National Drug and Alcohol Strategy (Reducing Harm Supporting Recovery), are to provide, where appropriate:

o Services aimed at delivering advice and harm-minimisation harm-reduction programmes to drug misusers not in contact with services, including advice on safer drug use, ways of reducing the risks of HIV and Hepatitis transmission, advice on safer sex practice and good health.

o Treatment programmes that are service-user focused and have as their objective, in the short-term, the control of the service-user’s addiction within the context of the long-term aim of returning the service-user to a drug-free life.

o Aftercare and rehabilitation programmes that assist service-users in accessing education, training or employment opportunities.

o Evaluation of the various service responses to ensure maximum effectiveness

· The Service works in partnership with Primary Care networks and teams, Mental Health Addiction Teams and other statutory and voluntary agencies.

· Services are delivered in the context of multidisciplinary teams in both community and residential settings. Teams are responsible for case management, assessing service-user needs, negotiating and delivering care plans and facilitating access for the target population within catchment areas.

· Counselling therapy is prioritised in service-user care plans as resources allow, by self-referral and professional referral within Clinical Teams and Community Networks.

· The post-holder will possess the skill-set necessary to respond to a broad range of service-user issues related to substance use including: motivation, harm-reduction, stabilisation, detoxification, relapse prevention, relationship difficulties, depression, anxiety, phobias, loss, coping with illness, abuse, developmental issues, adjustment problems, stress, trauma, violence, anger, and psychosexual difficulties, drawing on therapeutic orientations such as person-centred and cognitive-behavioural therapies with a particular emphasis on short-term intervention.

· The overall Service is managed by the Addiction Lead, North West s and GP Clinical Lead. Counselling is managed by Senior Counsellors.