Behavioral Health Clinician

PURPOSE:
Youth Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) services are focused on improving or ameliorating the significant functional impairments and sever symptomatology experienced by youth due to mental illness or serious emotional disturbance. Clinical and rehabilitative interventions are also focused on enhancing family functioning to foster health/wellbeing, stability and re-integration for youth who are returning home after residential treatment or in-patient hospitalization. The Youth ACT Team is a multi-disciplinary team and works together to provide family-driven, youth-guided and developmentally appropriate services to comprehensively address the needs of youth within the family, school, medical, behavioral, psychosocial and community domains.

POSITION OVERVIEW:
The Youth ACT Team Licensed Behavioral Health Clinician works as part of a multi-disciplinary team to provide treatment and support services to families and children, ages 10 to 21, who have significant behavioral health needs and who are at risk of entering, or returning home from high end services, such as inpatient settings or residential services. The role involves providing highly individualized services focused on clinical treatment, family psychoeducation and skills development. The Behavioral Health Clinician provides services to youth and families in their homes and communities and collaborates closely with other service providers and systems with which the family interacts. The role will require some evening availability and rotating on-call coverage.

KEY ESSENTIAL FUNCTIONS:

• Provide therapeutic treatment to the child and their family/caregivers to address the clinical needs of the child and the complex needs of the family unit
• Engage and collaborate child/youth and family as active partners in developing, reviewing, and modifying a course of care that supports the child/youth’s progress towards identified goals related to restoring, building or enhancing functionality as well as the development of a relapse prevention plan where appropriate.
• Engage and support the child/youth and family in defining their desired goals and the action steps by which to achieve them.
• Assess risk, develop safety plans
• Provide on-call after hour crisis intervention services when needed to participants and their support network, including respite referrals and other diversion and stabilization services.
• Participate in both the development and implementation of a person-centered care plan that includes formal and informal supports that increase opportunities for improved quality of life. Focus is on creating meaningful and productive daily activities in the community.
• Actively participate in Daily Team Meetings and serve as a core member of a multidisciplinary team, contributing insights, updates, and collaborative planning to ensure cohesive service delivery.
• Monitor appropriate discharge and ongoing care planning at pre-and post-transition for individuals transitioning to community.
• Establish collaborative working relationships and acts as a liaison with community providers, Managed Care Plans, schools, and medical providers.
• Complete case documentation and data reporting in compliance with productivity standards.
• Monitor, evaluate and track participant progress toward care plan goals and adjust services as needed.
• Foster relationship with community provides to ensure that recipients are connected with appropriate services as they transition back into the community and to share or collect collateral information.
• Appointment navigation by accompanying to appointments-including but not limited to travel training, reengagement in community care, and ability to identify needs and barriers to services as well as making appropriate referrals
• Attend and participate in team meetings and supervisory sessions.
• Perform other related duties as assigned.

CORE COMPETENCIES:

• Knowledge of mental illness, serious emotional disturbance and substance use disorders.
• Delivers services that are trauma-informed, culturally sensitive and incorporate an anti-oppressive lens
• Proactive in terms of therapeutic interventions, continuous monitoring and engagement efforts
• Commitment to building and strengthening therapeutic and family relationships across all interactions
• Identifies and builds on individual, family and community strengths; empowers youth and families
• Ability to develop, evaluate, implement and modify a clinical treatment plan/intervention to meet the needs of individual youth and families with a focus on achievable outcomes
• Functions effectively as a team player within a multi-disciplinary team environment.
• Demonstrates ability to document assessments, care plans, and interventions accurately and in a timely manner.
• Ensure documentation supports continuity of care and meets compliance standards.

EDUCATIONAL/TRAINING REQUIRED:

• Licensure (LMSW, LCSW, LMFT, LCAT) in a Behavioral Health or related field

EXPERIENCE REQUIRED/LANGUAGE PREFERENCE:

• A minimum of one (1) year of experience in providing direct services to children with serious emotional disturbance and their families
• Fluency in Spanish preferred

COMPUTER SKILLS REQUIRED:

• Working knowledge of Microsoft Office, ability to learn electronic health records and other software as required

VISUAL AND MANUAL DEXIERITY:

• Able to read paper and electronic documents and perform significant data entry into various computer programs.
• Manual dexterity and hand-eye coordination to travel independently using public transportation.

WORK ENVIRONMENT/PHYSICAL EFFORT

• Frequent travel throughout the assigned borough (Bronx, Queens, Staten Island); infrequent travel throughout NYC
• The work environment varies from office-based interaction with co-workers and members (20-40% of the time).
• Serving members in their homes and in other community settings (e.g. hospitals, clinics, benefit offices) 80% of the time. While the offices of the Jewish Board are accessible in accordance with the ADA, the sites to which staff may need to travel may or may not be.
• Performing the essential functions of this job, the candidate must be able to travel within New York City carrying equipment such as a laptop, and cell phone weighing up to approximately 10 pounds.
• Perform the essential functions of this job; the candidate is routinely required to sit (30% of the time), stand (35% of the time), and travel to and from appointments using varied public and private transportation options (35% of the time).
• Risks/hazards associated with the position are those which may be encountered when traveling around New York City. Frequent travel throughout Bronx, Queens, and Staten Island.
• The position is currently hybrid, with three in person office days and one hybrid day per week, (subject to change) and may transition to 100% in-person based on program needs.

We are an equal opportunity employer that does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, marital status, veteran status, or any other status protected by applicable federal, state, or local law.