Students taking the Psychological Wellbeing Practitioner course must operate at all times from an inclusive values base which promotes recovery and recognises and respects diversity. Diversity encompasses the range of cultural norms, including personal, family, social and spiritual values, held by the diverse communities served by the service within which the worker is operating. Students must respect and value individual differences in age, sexuality, disability, gender, spirituality, race and culture. Students must also take into account any physical and sensory difficulties people may experience in accessing services and make provision in their work to mitigate these. They must be able to respond to people’s needs sensitively with regard to all aspects of diversity. They must demonstrate a commitment to equal opportunities for all and encourage people’s active participation in every aspect of care and treatment. They must also demonstrate an understanding an awareness of the power issues in professional/patient relationships and take steps in their clinical practice to reduce any potential for negative impact these may have.
PWPs are also expected to operate in a stepped-care, high-volume environment. During training, trainee PWPs should carry a reduced caseload, with the number of cases seen depending on their stage in training, building up to a maximum of 60-80% of a qualified PWP’s caseload at the end of training. Students must be able to manage caseloads, operate safely and to high standards and use supervision to aid their clinical decision making. Psychological Wellbeing Practitioners need to recognise the limitations to their competence and role and direct people to resources appropriate to their needs, including step-up therapy; and they must focus on social inclusion – including return to work or other meaningful activity – as well as clinical improvement. To do so they must have knowledge of a wide range of social and health resources available through statutory and community agencies. They must have a clear understanding of what constitutes high-intensity psychological treatment and how this differs from low-intensity work.
This module will, therefore, expose PWPs to the concept of diversity, inclusion and multi-culturalism and equip workers with the necessary knowledge, attitudes and competencies to operate in an inclusive values driven service. In addition it will also equip students with an understanding of the complexity of people’s health, social and occupational needs and the services which can support people to recovery. It will develop students’ decision making abilities and enable them to use supervision and to recognise when and where it is appropriate to seek further advice or for the client to access a signposted or step-up service. Skills teaching will develop students’ clinical management, liaison and decision-making competencies in the delivery of support to patients, particularly where they require intervention or advice outside the core low-intensity evidence-based individual or group interventions taught in module 2.