Adult social work in Hertfordshire

Our hospitals teams stretch across our county, from Princess Alexandra to Barnet & Chase Farm, Addenbrookes, Stoke Mandeville and Luton & Dunstable.

We support Hertfordshire residents to return home safely, working with their strengths, community resources and a support package, if needed. 
 

 

As a hospital social worker, you will work with individuals, their families and professionals to ensure the person's safe discharge from hospital.

You will be responsible for:

• assessing the needs of patients and their carers
• arranging appropriate care packages and services
• liaising with other professionals and agencies
• ensuring a safe and timely discharge.

 

We also have Hospital Review teams, which follows up with people immediately after discharge to ensure ongoing support is available. 

As a hospital social worker, you will:

• carry out assessments and reviews in residential and nursing homes, as well as people’s own homes
• work to prevent re-admission to hospital and to establish and plan to meet longer term outcomes.  

 

We cover anywhere that a resident of Hertfordshire may be admitted to. This includes Addenbrookes, Lister Hospital, Princess Alexandra, Watford General Hospital, Barnet General, Luton, Dunstable and Stoke Mandeville hospitals. We also support community hospitals providing rehabilitation.

We offer a 7 day service and currently operate a 1-weekend-in-8 rota across the Hospital Team.

Each team is made up of community care officers, social workers, a support officer, team manager and deputy manager. 

Watford General, Barnet General and the Post Hospital Review Team also have advanced practitioners.

The work can be complex and demanding at times, but it's extremely rewarding. We work with each person to make sure the care is tailored to their specific needs.

 

Princess Alexandra Hospital Team – you will work as part of a busy social care team at Princess Alexandra Hospital, where you will use your professional knowledge and skills to complete social care assessments to ensure that people are discharged in a safe and timely manner. You will adhere to Hertfordshire’s Connected Lives Practice Principles by ensuring that people are supported to maintain their independence and receive person-centred care and support. You will use your knowledge of the Care Act 2014, Mental Capacity Act 2005, and other social care legislation, to manage complex cases. You will develop close working relationships with care providers and the Hospital’s Discharge Team to ensure effective care planning. 

Barnet and Chase Farm Team – you will work as part of a fast paced, busy, small and supportive team at Barnet Hospital. We are based onsite at Barnet Hospital so we can work collaboratively together and communicate effectively as a team, in order to discharge our Hertfordshire residents in a timely and safe way from hospital. We offer a daily flexible work pattern to support travel and caring responsibilities you may have, for example your chosen hours could be: 8am to 4pm or 10am to 6pm. We are committed to developing your career by offering a high quality training programme and supervision. We encourage you to take the lead in unique roles that you may be interested in and representing our team in these roles. For example Wellbeing, Equality & Diversity and many practice areas, that are high on our agenda. Driving is essential for this role but note that Barnet Hospital is now in a ULEZ Zone.

Our Connected Lives Gateway Service is the front door to adult social care in Hertfordshire and aims to prevent, reduce and delay need by ensuring people can access a wide range of information, advice and support. We’re making a significant investment in prevention, offering a unique opportunity to shape services that deliver better outcomes for people.

We’re recruiting social workers to support the Gateway Service to deliver our vision by working with people through short-term, focused interventions.

 

• Gateway Connections – this multi-disciplinary team of social workers, occupational therapists and community care officers works flexibly, both from the office and remote locations, to bring together a vast amount of experience and skill in providing initial assessments and tailored information to new people approaching adult social care. You would be working alongside a variety of partners to achieve the best preventative solutions.
• Gateway Assessment East / West – providing short term focused assessments for people who would benefit from a preventative or enabling approach to social care.  A multi-disciplinary team of social workers, occupational therapists and community care officers providing first time assessments in the community for a period of up to 12 weeks. We are really passionate about prevention – these community teams are looking for more like minded colleagues to push our prevention targets further.

Based in Hemel Hempstead and Stevenage and working across services within those areas, the Adult Disability Service provides support to adults living with a learning or physical disability.

We aim to enable people to make positive decisions in their lives, promote their independence and ensure they can get involved in their local community. We're a service motivated by and dedicated to social care intervention and community social work.

We’re looking for social workers and senior social workers who can engage with people, promoting and enabling inclusive community options, as well as self-directed purchased services. The teams are community-based and applicants will need to have a full UK driving licence.  

We also offer hybrid-working, working from the office a minimum of 2 days a week.

This is a fast-paced environment. Our locality teams focus on complex cases and include general assessments and care planning. You'll support with:

• completing care needs assessment
• developing innovative support plans
• building networks
• raising awareness in the area and developing valuable links for the team. 

 

You'll work alongside community care officers, community learning disability nurses and occupational therapists to achieve the best outcomes for the people you work with.

 

Adult Disability Team East – Farnham House, Stevenage

The Adult Disability Service provide support to adults with a learning or physical disability and we promote personalisation through our new assessment process, focusing on the wellbeing of the individual. Through care planning we strive for increased independence, choice and control by offering personal budgets to enable people to direct their own support.

We are looking for social workers to work in line with Connected Lives principles in this person focussed area.

 

Social worker – Review team 

This is a fast paced environment and you will review care packages, develop innovative support plans, build networks and raise awareness in the area developing valuable links for the team.

You will support with completing care needs assessment, developing innovative support plans, building networks and raising awareness in the area and developing valuable links for the team. 

You will work alongside community care officers, community learning disability nurses and occupational therapists to achieve the best outcomes for the individuals you work with.

Could you bring your experience and passion for improving outcomes for people over age 65 and their carers with social care needs to the Older Person Service?

It is an inspiring time to be working in Hertfordshire. We are giving back control to people by talking through ways to achieve personal goals, get involved in the community and be as independent as possible. We are committed to deliver a better adult social care experience through a responsive and person-centred approach, focussing on people and carers outcomes they wish to achieve.

We are re-energising our adult social care model of Connected Lives approach that has a strong ethos of strength-based working, identifying personal goals and ensuring personal, family and community resources are utilised to achieve positive outcomes for people.

The Older Person Service is a dynamic service that works across the community under the Care Act to safeguard,  assess, plan support and review adults and cares with long term health and social care needs. We have a range of teams within Older People services, including locality based teams, both residential and community reviewing teams, crisis intervention and prevention of hospital admission teams, and sensory services.  We can offer Hybrid working arrangements, flexible working practices, community engagement and volunteer activities and, as part of our commitment to you, as well as promote your continuous Learning & Development.