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Allied health professionals at Sussex Partnership are a highly skilled and diverse group. They work with the people who use our services to maximise their abilities, enabling them to be as independent as possible and to live full, active and healthy lives.

There are over 500 allied health professionals at Sussex Partnership, working across seven of the 14 AHP professions, which include:

  • Occupational therapists
  • Dieticians
  • Speech and language therapists
  • Physiotherapists
  • Art therapists
  • Music therapists
  • Dramatherapists

View allied health professional career pathways

What an allied health professional career has to offer

The allied health professions are a vital part of the NHS workforce. Using a variety of evidence-based skills, they work alongside other members of the team from different professional backgrounds to improve the lives of service users and carers.

They take a strength-based and recovery-focused approach to helping people, playing a key role in supporting them to live independently in the community, or to find the type of supported living that meets their needs. Helping people to improve their health and wellbeing in this way is a privilege, and the results are hugely rewarding.

An allied health professional career provides opportunities to explore and specialise in a range of areas of practice. Whatever your interest or skills, you can find a career to suit you.

Allied health professionals meet and work with a diverse range of colleagues. Working alongside each other sharing skills and best practice helps us deliver the best outcomes for the people under the care of our services.

Working as an allied health professional also brings excellent opportunities for continual learning and career development.

This is a very positive field to work in.

How we work - and what it's like to work with us

Working as an allied health professional at Sussex Partnership involves being part of an exciting team and working collaboratively with lots of different roles. It means building and using a broad range of skills, but with the opportunity to develop specialist skills too. Collaboration is key – with each other as colleagues and with the people who use our services.

You can work your way up to senior positions where you can focus on improving services, but that doesn’t mean you have to lose all direct contact with the people under the care of those services. Working in partnership with people to help them to live as fully and actively as possible is a privilege.

View allied health professional career pathways

Why choose to work in the allied health professions at Sussex Partnership

We are a large, confident Trust where we fully recognise the importance of our allied health professions workforce. We offer a great deal to support and nurture them.

 

Education and training

We have an excellent structure and support for education, training and continuing professional development (CPD) which is responsive and tailored to the needs of individuals. We design and support the delivery of up-to-date, relevant training for our allied health professional staff across the career span. Our programme content is innovative and places quality of care at the heart of our teaching.

Practice placements

We are committed to practice placement education and support the education of student allied health professionals within Sussex Partnership. Experience gained on practice placements ensures that new graduates develop into safe, competent and reflective practitioners. It ensures they are equipped to work in a range of healthcare settings and are eligible for registration with the Health and Care Professions Council.

Teamwork

We are a very supportive team at all levels, in terms of both formal and informal supervision. If any team member is ever in need of help or reassurance, there is always someone they can talk to.

Leadership

Sussex Partnership has invested in a clear leadership structure for allied health professionals, which means we contribute at all levels of the organisation.

Everyone counts

We recognise the importance of all of the allied health professions groups within our Trust, and are making a concerted effort to develop and support even the traditionally smaller groups.

Improvement

We believe in continuous improvement. We offer the chance to be part of a dynamic team which wants to listen, learn and develop to help us improve the care we provide to service users and families. Within this team, there are wide and varied opportunities to develop personal skills

Your development

We are keen to work with you to help you develop and grow in your role.

Digital

We support allied health professionals to be digital enabled and to use digital technologies to transform health, care and wellbeing.

Annual conference

We have an annual allied health professions conference which is always well attended and receives positive feedback

All of these factors contribute to our strong rates of staff retention; once people join us at Sussex Partnership, they tend to want to stay.

This is an exciting time to be an allied health professional at Sussex Partnership, and we expect that to only continue and increase. Get involved!

Meet the professions

There are several different professions within the allied health professions at Sussex Partnership:

  • Physiotherapists help people with a range of problems affecting movement - using exercise, massage and various other techniques.
  • Anyone with physical problems caused by illness, injury, disability or aging might get help from a physiotherapist.
  • Physiotherapists work across all six community learning disability teams in Sussex. We work very much as part of a collaborative team with a variety of other health professionals. Our role is wide and varied from falls prevention and rehabilitation to the management of long-term physical disability and health promotion.
  • As part of this team, you could be based in a hospital, or work out in the community, in a health centre or visiting service users’ homes.
  • When people with learning disabilities need the extra support of a hospital stay to help with their mental and emotional health and wellbeing, they may also need the skills of a physiotherapist to help support their mobility. A physiotherapist will work with people whilst they stay as an inpatient to keep them steady, prevent falls and improve and increase their physical functioning and mobility.
  • We are currently looking to develop this service providing specialist provision around mobility and falls prevention, postural care, physical activity and health promotion.
  • An occupational therapist helps people continue their work, studies, leisure activities and everyday tasks during illnesses, injuries, disabilities or ageing.
  • They can help people learn to use assistive technology, help adapt their home or workplace to meet their needs, and work with people to find new ways to approach tasks.
  • Occupational therapists work as part of a team with a variety of other health professionals. They can also supervise junior staff or occupational therapy support workers.
  • Occupational therapists can help all kinds of people, from children to older people, with mental health problems, learning disabilities, and a range of other conditions. You could work with individuals and their families, and with groups of people.
  • They support people with a range of interventions to enable them to return to or optimise participation in all the things that people do - for example, caring for themselves and others, working, learning, playing and interacting with others. Being deprived of or having limited access to any or all of these can affect physical and psychological health, so occupational therapists have an important contribution to make to supporting people’s wellbeing and rehabilitation.
  • Speech and language therapists help people of all ages with speech, language and communication problems. They can also help people with eating, drinking and swallowing difficulties.
  • We have over 25 speech and language therapists at Sussex Partnership working across our services, including with children and younger people, older adults and people living with dementia.
  • A dietitian helps people make informed and practical choices about food, based on the science of nutrition. As well as diagnosing and treating dietary and nutritional problems, dietitians teach people to understand food, promote good health and prevent disease.
  • Dieticians at Sussex Partnership can help people with a range of issues such as those wanting to lose or gain weight, or those with eating disorders, digestive problems or allergies.
  • Dieticians are the only qualified health professionals who assess, diagnose and treat diet and nutritional problems at an individual and wider public health level.
  • Dieticians use the most up–to-date public health and scientific research on food, health and disease, which they translate into practical guidance to enable people to make appropriate lifestyle and food choices. Dietitians are the only nutrition professionals to be regulated by law, and are governed by an ethical code to ensure that they always work to the highest standard.
  • Art therapists use art as a form of psychotherapy to encourage clients to explore a variety of issues including emotional, behavioural or mental health problems, learning or physical disabilities, life-limiting conditions, neurological conditions or physical illnesses.
  • People of all ages from children to the elderly, regardless of artistic experience, can use art therapy in this way as an aid to support them with their particular concern.  It is not a diagnostic tool but rather a mode of communication and expression.
  • Dramatherapists are both clinicians and artists that draw on their knowledge of theatre/drama and therapy to use performance arts as a medium for psychological therapy.  Clients are able to explore a wide variety of different issues and needs from autism and dementia to physical/sexual abuse and mental illness in an indirect way leading to psychological, emotional and social changes.
  • Music therapists engage people in live musical interaction to promote an individual’s emotional wellbeing and improve their communication skills.  The people they work with do not need to have any previous experience of playing a musical instrument (or even singing) as this established psychological clinical intervention utilises their unique connection to music and the relationship established with their therapist to help:
    • Develop and facilitate communication skills
    • Improve self-confidence and independence
    • Enhance self-awareness and awareness of others, and
    • Improve concentration and attention skills.

Latest allied health professionals vacancies

To apply to join our allied health professional team and find out about current opportunities, go to our jobs feed.

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