Psychotherapist

Explanation of the position:

The psychotherapist based in Bekaa/Baalback Hermel will provide Mental Health and Psychosocial Support services to people with MHPSS needs in the PHCC and in the community and will contribute to the build the capacities of the PHCC staff and Community Outreach Volunteers.

Main responsibilities:

1. Provide psychological assessment, support and individual and/or group psychological intervention to persons with mental health and psychosocial needs, in coordination with the case management and coordination team.
2. Contribute to emergencies response through the provision of Psychological First Aid/Identification and referral, as well as Psychological First Aid (PFA) training.

3. Implement psychosocial activities including group support in the Primary Health Care Centers and in the community.

4. Support in the integration of Mental Health into Primary Health Care, including in the capacity-building of PHCC staff

5. Contribute to capacity-building and awareness raising activities about MPHSS

6. Provide staff and frontliner care activities to PHCC staff, Community Outreach Volunteers (COVs), and other frontliners

Main Activities:

1. Provision of psychological assessment and appropriate mental health intervention to persons with mental health and psychosocial support needs.

• Provide assessment and appropriate mental health support including psychoeducation, and individual and/or group short-term psychological intervention to service users with mental health and psychosocial needs.
• Collaborate closely with the case-management team in assessing the persons’ needs and developing and implementing individualized action plans through regular case discussions.
• Ensure proper follow up of service users enrolled in the services and make sure the appointments with service users are properly scheduled and respected.
• Ensure that emergency cases are properly taken care of, referred, and followed.
• Closely work with the MdM MHPSS coordination to ensure the quality of the service provision.
• Commit with timely clinical documentation for all service users related data.

2. Contribution to response to emergencies through the provision of Psychological First Aid (PFA)/ needs identification and referral, and PFA training.

• In case of emergency, provide PFA/needs identification and referral to community members in need for support.
• Provide training on PFA to PHCCs staff, community outreach volunteers and other stakeholders.

3. Implementation of psychosocial activities, in the Primary Health Care Center (PHCC) and the community (including shelters, municipalities, etc).

• Contribute to the assessment of MHPSS interventions needs in the PHCCs and in the communities, including shelters, and suggest appropriate interventions.
• Participate in establishing and implementing psychosocial activities including preventive activities in the community.
• Design, organize and implement group support activities in the PHCCs and in the community.

4. Support in the integration of Mental Health into Primary Health Care.

• Contribute to the assessment of Primary Health Care Centers (PHCCs) staff needs in MHPSS.
• Contribute to the design and implementation of MHPSS capacity-building activities for PHCCs staff including sensitization sessions and supervision.
• Contribute to the design and implementation of awareness raising activities in PHCCs.

5. Contribution to capacity-building and awareness raising activities about MPHSS

• Support in the training of the case management team, Community Outreach Volunteers (COVs) and other stakeholders on MHPSS related issues.
• Prepare and implement awareness sessions about MHPSS in the community, including in shelters.

6. Provision of staff and frontliner care activities to PHCC staff, COVs, and other frontliners.

• Prepare support group activities targeting frontliners based on the guidelines developed by NMHP and MdM resources.
• Implement cycles of support group activities with PHCC staff, COVs, and partners frontliners.

7. Reporting, meetings and training

• Commit to clinical documentation and with reporting for other MHPSS related activities.
• Commit with daily data collection and entry, respecting deadlines
• Participate in internal technical and non-technical meetings and take responsibility for documentation of the meeting minutes.
• Participate in regular meetings with key actors, NGOs/INGOs and PHC, hospital
• Participate in network/coordination meetings concerning MHPSS as required by the supervisor.
• Participate in internal MdM meetings (all staff meetings, team meetings)
• Participate in training organized by MdM, NMHP and other stakeholders
• Take an active role with center’s visitors to present and promote the services
• Contribute to events related to MHPSS.

Behaviour:

• To behave with self-restraint at all times and respect the dignity and confidentiality of the service users.
• To be able to work as part of a team and participate in all activities of the mental health unit.
• To believe in concepts of equity, human rights, neutrality and impartiality.
• Demonstrate motivation at work.
• Demonstrate willingness to improve own knowledge and skills by participating in any capacity building activities.
• Respect each team member’s position, work and specialty.
• Adapt to special situations or demands from supervisor.
• Respect different cultures.

Requested Competence/skills:

• MA in Clinical Psychology 
• Holds MoPH Licence to practice
• 2 to 3 years of experience in psychotherapy
• Practitioner skills in short-term therapy (trained in IPT and/or CBT, or other therapeutic approach)
• Follows individual supervision
• Believes in a comprehensive, holistic and recovery approach in mental health.
• Arabic and English languages are mandatory.
• Experience working with NGO is preferred.

• Ability to organize, plan and prioritize tasks.
• Ability to identify strengths and weakness and in proposing shared solutions for the continuous improvement of providing quality services.
• Strong ability to observe, analyse, report and take initiative.
• Ability to work with a team as well as to work independently.
• Clear commitment in the project thematic.
• Ability to communicate any technical or non-technical topic with clarity and to share any important project information with the team.
• Ability to self-reflect on own work, to recognize what needs improvement and to propose solutions.
• Proficiency with Microsoft word and excel.