This Senior Social Worker (PTSD) utilizes intensive clinical case management via interdisciplinary treatment teams, to provide care to veterans with severe and persistent mental illnesses in community settings and is located at the VA medical center in West Haven CT.

Duties

Duties include but are not limited to: Conduct psychosocial assessments to determine needs of veterans and family member. Participate in discharge planning with other disciplines and will be responsible for ensuring that discharge plans are executed in a manner that is timely and appropriate. Provide consultation/education to veterans and families on community resources, advance directives and VA benefits. Act as liaison between VA and community resources, to include marketing and public relation duties as needed. Provide a full range of social work services within commonly accepted standards of social work practice which includes case work, individual, family and group counseling, discharge planning, case management and other services as appropriate. Assist patients and their significant others with coping and dealing with the loss and grief experiences in disability, terminal illness and death. Participate in a rotation of on-call social workers, including modification of tour of duty to accommodate patient care needs on weekends. Work Schedule: Monday-Friday, 8am-430pm Compressed/Flexible: Not Authorized Telework: Position is suitable. Virtual: This is not a virtual position. Functional Statement #: F1279 Relocation/Recruitment Incentives: Not Authorized Financial Disclosure Report: Not required

Requirements

Qualifications

Basic Requirements: United States Citizenship: Non-citizens may only be appointed when it is not possible to recruit qualified citizens in accordance with VA Policy. English Language Proficiency. In accordance with 38 U.S.C. 7402(d), no person shall serve in direct patient care positions unless they are proficient in basic written and spoken English. Master's degree in Social Work from a school of social work fully accredited by the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE). Graduates of schools of social work that are in candidacy status do not meet this requirement until the school of social work is fully accredited. Note: A doctoral degree in Social Work may NOT be substituted for the master's degree in Social Work. Verification of the degree can be made by going to http://www.cswe.org/Accreditation to verify that the social work degree meets the accreditation standards for a Master of Social Work. Licensed or certified by a state to independently practice social work at the advanced practice level which included an advanced generalist or clinical examination, unless they are grandfathered by the state in which they are licensed to practice at the advanced practice level (except for licenses issued in California, which administers its own clinical examination for advanced practice) and they must be able to provide supervision for licensure. Grade Determinations: In addition to the basic requirements stated above, the following qualification criteria must be met for each grade. The candidate's qualifications must clearly demonstrate the level of competence required for the grade. Senior Social Worker GS-12 Experience: At least two years of experience post advanced practice clinical licensure and should be in a specialized area of social work practice of which, one year must be equivalent to the GS-11 grade level. Senior social workers have experience that demonstrates possession of advanced practice skills and judgment and are experts in their specialized area of practice. Senior social workers may have certification or other post-masters training from a nationally recognized professional organization or university that includes a defined curriculum/course of study and internship or equivalent supervised professional experience in a specialty. Demonstrated Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities. In addition to the experience above, candidates must demonstrate all of the following KSAs: Skill in a range of specialized interventions and treatment modalities used in specialty treatment programs or with special patient populations. This includes individual, group, and/or family counseling or psychotherapy and advanced level psychosocial and/or case management. Ability to incorporate complex multiple causation in differential diagnosis and treatment within approved clinical privileges or scope of practice. Knowledge in developing and implementing methods for measuring effectiveness of social work practice and services in the specialty area, utilizing outcome evaluations to improve treatment services and to design system changes. Ability to provide specialized consultation to colleagues and students on the psychosocial treatment of patients in the service delivery area, as well as role modeling effective social work practice skills. Ability to expand clinical knowledge in the social work profession, and to write policies, procedures, and/or practice guidelines pertaining to the service delivery area. Preferred Experience: Experience providing outpatient mental health treatment (PTSD expertise). Reference: VA Regulations, specifically VA Handbook 5005, Part II, Appendix G-39 Social Worker Qualification Standard. This can be found in the local Human Resources Office. Physical Requirements: The work is generally sedentary. The work requires intermittent standing and walking, with periods of bending and sitting. The work requires light lifting and carrying of light items (under 15 lbs.) such as charts, notes, reports and binders. Simple grasping and fine manipulation is required when using a keyboard to access a computer. The work requires the incumbent to drive a government vehicle for conducting visits in the community. Work is typically performed in both a clinical and community-based setting which may expose the incumbent to the communicable diseases common to the Veteran population. The incumbent may be required to work an irregular tour and/or weekends as the need arises performs related duties as assigned.

Education

IMPORTANT: A transcript must be submitted with your application if you are basing all or part of your qualifications on education.

Note: Only education or degrees recognized by the U.S. Department of Education from accredited colleges, universities, schools, or institutions may be used to qualify for Federal employment. You can verify your education here: http://ope.ed.gov/accreditation/. If you are using foreign education to meet qualification requirements, you must send a Certificate of Foreign Equivalency with your transcript in order to receive credit for that education. For further information, visit: http://www.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ous/international/usnei/us/edlite-visitus-forrecog.html.

Contacts

• Address West Haven VA Medical Center 950 Campbell Avenue West Haven, CT 06516 US
• Name: Shane Mortimer
• Phone: 413-584-4040 X6874
• Email: [email protected]